Aim
To explore the understanding of and practices of health‐care workers in weaning children from feeding tubes.
Methods
An electronic survey of doctors, nurses, and allied health professionals at Children's Health Queensland obtained demographic information and awareness of various areas of tube feeding management particularly tube weaning.
Results
The 155 health‐care providers formed three well‐matched groups in terms of number and years of experience. Only 18 had formal training in tube weaning. Participants had high levels of knowledge regarding reasons for commencing and possible complications associated with tube feeding. However, health‐care providers generally were found to have limited to no knowledge of tube weaning practices. Nearly half of participants (46%) did not know the best time to plan for a tube wean and only 16 indicated that they or their work units documented tube exit plans, regardless of type of feeding tube, in children's medical charts. Time frames were rarely included as part of tube exit plans. Participants ranked medical stability and presence of a safe swallow most highly as important indicators for successful tube weaning. Multidisciplinary management was also identified as valuable. Tube weaning was predominately managed by children's primary health unit/service and largely involved a medical officer and dietician.
Conclusions
Poor awareness of tube weaning practices such as tube exit strategies may be impacting on the quality of care received by children who are tube fed. Future research should be directed towards developing and evaluating guidelines accompanied by educational resources to further advance tube weaning practices.
This article presents an agenda to improve the care and wellbeing of children with paediatric feeding disorder who require tube feeding (PFD‐T). PFD‐T requires urgent attention in practice and research. Priorities include: routine collection of PFD‐T data in health‐care records; addressing the tube‐feeding lifecycle; and reducing the severity and duration of disruption caused by PFD‐T where possible. This work should be underpinned by principles of involving, respecting and connecting families.
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