Open Forum

Is anyone willing to share their policy related to minors receiving care without a parent present? We are seeing an uptick in 15-17 year olds being dropped off for their appointments. 

Thank you!

Hi Sheilah,

If you haven't already, I would recommend cross posting this question in the Pediatric SIG community as well. In my organization, as a general rule, we do not see minor patients without their parents, and we will contact parents or guardians and let them know the child cannot be seen until they are present (this is particularly true in our urgent cares). We do occasionally make exceptions for patients that are able to drive themselves if it is for maintenance type visit as long as their guardian is available to give verbal consent over the phone and is available to join the visit virtually and they are a well-known patient. We don't have a policy outlining the exceptions, but our RISK department has asked us to contact them as the needs arise to review the safety of the plan. Some examples of when this happens is if we have a 17-year-old diabetic patient that is well controlled, seen in our clinic quarterly, and has an appointment after school and the parent isn't able to physically join. Or for our sports PT gyms, this happens somewhat often for teenage athletes receiving frequent therapy. In that environment, they have the parent sign a form at the first visit consenting to the child being seen in the future without them.  Again, we only allow this in specific circumstances, but it does occur from time to time. Hope this helps.

Is anyone willing to share their policy related to minors receiving care without a parent present? We are seeing an uptick in 15-17 year olds being dropped off for their appointments. 

Thank you!