Invisible work of using health knowledge by parents

What is it about?

Parents who care for young children with chronic conditions are knowledge users of health information. Their efforts, time, and energy to source, consider and monitor this information add to the ‘invisible’ work of parents in making decisions about care, school transitions, and interventions. Little is known or understood about the work of parents as knowledge users. This paper serves to dive deeper into this unknown, presenting a clearer look at what this process of using knowledge might look like.

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Why is it important?

Knowing how parents of children with chronic conditions use health information can help doctors, therapists, and any health professional involved in delivering health information to this population do this more effectively. It also sheds light on the diversity between parents in how they use health information, and in some cases illustrates the large amount of time dedicated to this "invisible" work by parents.