Children with Complex Medical Care Needs and COVID-19

About the OCCM Project

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Children with Complex Medical Care Needs and COVID-19

Children with Complex Medical Care Needs and Inclusive Education

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Children Made Vulnerable through Health Conditions and Disability:

an International Exploration of Relevant Issues and Assets during the Pandemic

Project overview and background

In recent years, the number of children with complex medical care needs in their everyday lives has been increasing in many countries. However, little is known about their daily lives and the specific challenges they face.

In 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic spread globally, and we conducted this project in Japan and the UK to gain a better understanding of how the pandemic affected the everyday lives of children with complex medical care needs and their families.

What makes this project unique is that in addition to conducting interviews with the children and their families, we used a method called "mobile ethnography." First, we set up a mobile ethnography platform called Indeemo, where participating children could upload photos and videos related to seven predetermined themes, along with comments, with the help of their families.

The seven themes were self-introduction, medical devices, daily medical care, hobbies/leisure time, support, the impact of COVID-19, and school/study. The period was set at six weeks, and during that time, we communicated with each family based on the photos and videos uploaded.

Through this process, we gained a deeper understanding of the impact of COVID-19 on the daily lives of children with complex medical care needs from their own perspectives.

Indeemo（PC）

Indeemo（Mobile）

Schedule

Sept. 2020

Osaka University and University College London collaborated to initiate 'Children Made Vulnerable through Health Conditions and Disability: an International Exploration of Relevant Issues and Assets during the Pandemic'.

Feb. – May 2021

We conducted field research, including interviews and mobile ethnography, in both Japan and the UK.

Dissemination

■ Conference presentation

Apr. 2022

Yamamoto and Tomomatsu, ‘Protecting and promoting the health and wellbeing of highly vulnerable children during and beyond the COVID-19 pandemic’ at the 24th International Union for Health and Education (IUHPE) (poster presentation)

Sept. 2022

Tomomatsu, Yamamoto, Rivas and Paulauskaite, ’A UK-Japan comparison of the gendered care burden of children with complex medical needs during COVID-19 pandemic’ at the BSA British Medical Sociology Conference 2022 (oral presentation)

Event

18 Jan 2023

We held a results report meeting online, which was attended by three members of the Japanese project team and 9 out of 12 participants who cooperated in the survey. First, the project team reported on the research results, including the analysis of the Japanese data and the research findings of the UK team. We then received feedback and opinions from the participants on the entire project. Subsequently, based on the discussion at the report meeting, we summarized the research results into a paper.