Frameworks That Inform Professionals' Communication and Early Support for Childhood Adversities: A Scoping Review

Abstract

Adverse experiences during childhood such as family violence, neglect, poverty, poor parental mental or physical health have negative immediate and lifelong impacts on children's health and development. Although many families experience adversities, families experience barriers to seeking support, and many professionals lack confidence to have sensitive conversations with these families. Aiming to inform the development of resources to guide professionals, we undertook a scoping review to (1) identify and describe communication frameworks for professionals and (2) describe if/how they were evaluated. Searches were conducted in Medline, Emcare, PsycInfo, Cumulative Index in Nursing and Allied Health Literature and Scopus from inception to January 2025. Following the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic reviews and Meta-Analyses extension for Scoping Reviews (PRISMA-ScR), we located 15 communication frameworks contained within 33 manuscripts. Key characteristics of the communication frameworks are presented, such as practice setting and intended users, which adversities were addressed and how they were evaluated. There were two broad types of communication framework, those which required professionals to actively screen and respond to family adversities, and those which provided opportunistic guidance and response without explicit screening. Most communication frameworks were in the global north, and many were not evaluated beyond their initial context. We could not locate any communication frameworks embedded within non-health-related settings, and none comprehensively addressed all adverse experiences known to impact children. Nonetheless, this review identified available evidence that can help inform tailoring and development of communication frameworks to build professionals' capacity for early intervention for family adversities.