Pediatric anxiety screening in a school-based setting

Abstract

Anxiety is one of the leading childhood mental health disorders and often goes undiagnosed. School based clinics play an important role in being able to screen students for anxiety and provide referrals if needed. Nurses working for Hawaii Keiki (HK): Healthy and Ready to Learn need guidance on what tool to use for screening elementary aged children. A literature review and analysis were conducted and a comprehensive list of commonly used anxiety screening tools utilized in the school setting was collected. The Spence Children’s Anxiety Scale (SCAS) was the most highly utilized and ideal for use by HK nurses as it is free and publicly available, has over 30 translations, and can be completed in under 10 minutes. It was recommended that HK utilize the SCAS in its elementary school clinics to screen students suspected of having anxiety. An evidence-based practice implementation project was performed to train HK nurses on anxiety and how to use the SCAS. A survey was given prior to the training to collect baseline knowledge and then the same survey was given after the training to determine the amount of knowledge gained from the training. Analysis of the survey data indicated that this implementation project was effective in educating the staff about anxiety and the appropriateness of the SCAS for the elementary school setting.