Adolescent hospital patients benefit from brief screening to identify disorders and prevent risky behaviors specific to this age group. Adolescent behavioral health screening tools are either fee-based or public domain. The training materials provided in the screening toolkit can be implemented by any hospital staff. Health screenings for adolescent patients address substance abuse, post-traumatic stress disorder and mental health problems such as depression.
Ashenbach System
The Ashenbach System of Empirically Based Assessment (ASEBA) has a small fee for its materials. The products contain age-appropriate, multicultural materials. The steps in this screening tool involve: recording the problems reported for large samples of adolescents; performing multivariate statistical analyses among the problems to identify syndromes of problems; using reports of skills and involvement in activities, social relations, school and work to assess competencies and adaptive functioning; and constructing profiles of scales for adolescents' age and gender. This tool contains screening scales for obsessive-compulsive disorders, post-traumatic disorders, sluggish cognitive tempo and positive qualities.
Pediatric Symptom Checklist
The Pediatric Symptom Checklist is a screening tool that is quickly downloaded in a variety of languages and can be administered through a self-report by the adolescent patient. Scoring of the screening by professional hospital staff takes minimal time and effort, which expedites referral to the appropriate counselor.
CRAFFT
The CRAFFT hospital screening tool is an acronym. The acronym relates to these key words in the questions: C - CAR; R - RELAX; A - ALONE; F - FORGET; F - FRIENDS; T - TROUBLE. This tool is available on small cards to ensure exact phrasing and provide administration mobility for the hectic pace of hospital trauma areas. The CRAFFT questions are specific to substance abuse and alcohol.
POSIT
POSIT is a self-report tool developed by the National Institute of Drug Abuse for adolescents. Hospitals must provide the adolescent with access to a computer to administer this screening tool. The POSIT screening tool assesses problems in the following functional areas: substance use, physical health, mental health, family relationships, peer relationships, education or learning disorders, vocational status, social skills, leisure and recreation, and aggressive behavior or delinquency.
Wong-Baker FACES Tool
The use of self-reporting by adolescents is improved when combined with the Wong-Baker FACES tool to assess level of pain or discomfort. Adolescent hospital patients do not always report accurate information, especially when obvious signs of pain are present. The Wong-Baker tool references the adolescent's visible emotions and provides an intuitive guide for hospital staff while administering other screening tools.
Tags: screening tool, hospital staff, Adolescent hospital, Adolescent hospital patients, Ashenbach System, hospital patients
