ABP Pediatric Palliative study plan

Differentiate nociceptive, neuropathic, and mixed pain in children, and select an age-appropriate assessment tool (FLACC, faces scale, numeric rating, or behavioral proxy) for each case.

Justify opioid initiation thresholds and the stepwise analgesic ladder for pediatric patients, including dosing by weight and by age band.

Calculate equianalgesic conversions and starting doses for opioid-naive versus opioid-tolerant infants, children, and adolescents.

Anticipate and manage opioid adverse effects (constipation, pruritus, sedation, respiratory depression) and state naloxone dosing and monitoring parameters.

Assess and grade dyspnea in a nonverbal or cognitively impaired child, and outline stepwise pharmacologic and nonpharmacologic management.

Construct treatment plans for nausea and vomiting, constipation, and anorexia-cachexia syndrome using pediatric-appropriate agents and routes.

Distinguish delirium, anxiety, and terminal restlessness, and match each to an appropriate first-line intervention.

Select antiseizure regimens for end-of-life seizure control via buccal, intranasal, subcutaneous, and rectal routes.

Describe proportional palliative sedation for refractory symptoms, including consent, monitoring, and ethical safeguards.

Elicit goals of care and values using a structured framework (ask-tell-ask, SPIKES, or NURSE) in a simulated family meeting.

Tailor disclosure of a serious diagnosis to three developmental stages (preschool, school-age, adolescent), including what children typically understand about death.

Recognize and respond to family conflict, denial, and requests to withhold information from the child.

Apply interpreter use, teach-back, and health-literacy techniques during bad-news conversations.

Draft a pediatric advance care plan and portable resuscitation-order style document, naming the surrogate decision-maker hierarchy and assent process.

Compare hospice eligibility, concurrent care, and perinatal or neonatal palliative care delivery models, and explain how each shapes the plan of care.

Map the interdisciplinary team roles and the settings of care (home, inpatient, hospice house) that a pediatric palliative patient may move between.

Explain consent, assent, and mature-minor considerations that govern who signs what in the advance care plan.

Recognize the clinical signs of imminent dying and translate each sign into a corresponding comfort-focused order.

Write complete orders for withdrawal of life-sustaining therapy, including premedication, extubation sequence, and post-withdrawal monitoring.

Manage last-days symptoms: oral secretions, fever, pain, dyspnea, and agitation, choosing routes available in the home.

Describe immediate post-death care, autopsy and organ or tissue donation conversations, and documentation requirements.

Differentiate anticipatory grief, uncomplicated grief, prolonged grief disorder, and major depression in children, siblings, and parents.

Select developmentally matched grief interventions spanning preschool through adolescence, and identify when to refer to specialty bereavement services.

Screen for complicated bereavement risk factors and state explicit referral triggers and timelines for follow-up contact.

Describe systems that support clinicians after a death, including moral distress debriefs and burnout mitigation.

Analyze conflicts among best-interests, harm principle, and relational autonomy in three ethically contested pediatric cases.

Conduct a structured spiritual history adapted for children and caregivers using a recognized framework (FICA or HOPE).

Compare cultural, religious, and family-centered norms around disclosure, dying rituals, and mourning that alter the care plan.

Trace the ethics consultation pathway for intractable disagreement, including futility disputes and the role of the institutional ethics committee.

Re-test all five domains under timed conditions to build pacing and stamina.

Re-teach your three weakest subtopics by writing your own explanations and questions for each.

Integrate knowledge in a whole-patient capstone case that requires symptom management, communication, ethics, and end-of-life planning within one plan.

Consolidate a final one-page summary sheet of high-yield numbers, doses, and frameworks for the last week before the exam.