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A child life specialist sharing a storybook on a tablet with a boy in a hospital bed
ForChild life specialists

Prepare children for procedures and hospital stays

Children cope better with procedures and hospital stays when they understand what will happen. PlaySpace helps you prepare them through play and share what worked with the rest of the care team.

For child life specialists:StudioSessionsAlliance
ViewingChild life specialists
Scope of care · Child life specialists

Support for your clinical goals

Choose an area of care to explore relevant activities, example goals and ways to use PlaySpace.

Area of care

Procedural preparation

Age-appropriate explanations of surgery, scans, IV starts and treatments before they happen.

How PlaySpace helps

Procedure stories starring the child’s own toy or character.

Example goal

Child can describe three steps of the procedure in their own words.

Features · Child life specialists

How PlaySpace helps child life specialists

Studio

Preparation through play

Age-appropriate stories walk a child through a procedure before it happens, which replaces uncertainty with something familiar.

Sessions

Bedside or remote

The same activities run on a tablet at the bedside or over video, so preparation is possible wherever the child is.

Alliance

Clear hand-offs to the team

Short notes describe which coping strategies helped, so nurses and physicians can use them too.

Your care day · Child life specialists

Tools for your daily work

Choose tools for preparing activities, running sessions, reviewing notes and supporting families.

1Before the session
Studio

Create procedure stories that feature a character or toy the child already knows.

2In the session
Sessions

Run coping and preparation activities at the bedside or remotely.

3Between sessions
Alliance

Draft hand-off notes that the care team can read quickly between tasks.

In practice · Child life specialists

Ways to use PlaySpace

01Studio

The evening before surgery

A story about the pre-operative room, told through the child’s own stuffed animal, helps them picture what the morning will be like.

02Sessions

A long admission

Bedside activities that change over the course of the stay help keep ordinary play and development going.

03Alliance

A change of shift

The incoming nurse can read a brief note about which coping strategies worked and continue using them.

FAQ

Questions, answered

More answers in the Quick start guide.

No. PlaySpace drafts notes, plans and summaries for you to review. Nothing reaches a family or the record until you approve it.

Explore more

Explore other roles, approaches and settings.

Across PlaySpace

Keep exploring

Ready when you are

See how PlaySpace supports child life specialists.

Our clinical team will walk you through PlaySpace with examples drawn from your discipline and care setting.