How to Create a Medical Summary for Your Child for Doctors and Hospitals

You’ve been waiting for that well-known specialist appointment for your child you scheduled three months earlier. Since you’ve waited so long to have your child seen by the specialist, why not get the most bang for your buck out of the visit? I mentioned this in a previous post for new parents, but I will reiterate it here. If you hand the basics about your child to the doctor in an organized manner, there is no doubt you will have a more productive visit. Remember those initial patient intake forms you often have to complete on arrival at the appointments before you see the doctor? Wouldn’t it be nice just to write “see attached summary” rather than completing that form for the twentieth time? So how do you create a medical summary for your child that you can hand over to the doctor? Well, here’s what it should look like:

1. Medical History for “Name, Date of Birth”
2. Allergies (these include medication, food or environmental allergies) – if you really want to be a star you can write what the reaction was next to the offending medication (i.e. Amoxicillin (rash), Bees (face swelling)
3. Daily Medications– you should write the name of the medication, the dose in milligrams as written on the bottle, and how many times per day your child takes it
4. As needed Medications– these are medications that you only use if you need them but should be mentioned
5. Medical History –if your child has a known diagnosis or diagnoses you can list them here. If you are not sure or you are seeing physicians to establish a diagnosis, a question mark will be fine.
6. Surgical History – List each surgery as well as you can describe it and the age your child was when the procedure was performed
7. Hospitalizations – Dates of hospitalization and why he/she was hospitalized
8. Birth History- If your child is a baby or toddler, this is more relevant but can also be relevant later for older children. How many weeks into pregnancy was your child born? How much did he/she weigh? Did he/she stay in the hospital for long before going home? Your doctor will ask other more specific questions as needed but this is a good start.
9. Developmental History – if you know your child is delayed, you can simply write delayed and the doctor will ask more questions. If you would like to be more specific, you can include the ages your child met certain milestones such as rolling, sitting on his/her own, crawling or speaking his/her first word.
10. Family History – This not only includes your child’s parents and siblings but it’s a good idea to find out about grandparents and other family members that may have major illnesses.
11. That’s a good start!! I try to keep a copy in my son’s to-go bag and one in his wheelchair he takes to school. The challenging part is remembering to update it but even if you don’t have a chance to update it, you will still have a good foundation. You can inform medical providers of any changes verbally when you see them. Please be aware that even when you hand your child’s provider a summary like this, the medical provider will still need to verify the information. It may seem frustrating because everything is written in your summary, but your provider will do this to ensure the information is accurate for your child’s benefit. Check out the sample summary below before you get started: