All Kids Thrive in Traverse City, launched the quality of life survey this past summer to help connect healthcare services to families who live in rural northern Michigan.
Toni Leaf-Odette is director of All Kids Thrive. She said one reason the survey was created was to gather data to see how they can help families of children with special healthcare needs in the event of a disaster.
“Knowing that families who live in chronic stress, who do have kids with chronic health conditions, will have different needs in the event of a disaster,” she explained.
The group is already getting a lot of information from northern Michigan parents.
Leaf-Odette said initial results are showing that parents are concerned that people are unaware of the barriers their families face. She said the most common theme is lack of awareness.
“It's kind of like, (parents are saying) 'Can you build some awareness so people know that we are here?’ They are also mentioning the drive that people are taking to get to specialist help downstate...that it's difficult to get to children’s hospitals and procedures that are in southern Michigan.”
Another goal of All Kids Thrive, is to get northern Michigan parents, specifically north of M-55, is to make one-on-one appointments with the families the first week of November.
Leaf-Odette said the data collected will then help their group develop the infrastructure to serve those parents and children.
The quality of life survey will be on their website through Nov. 15.
