Tracking health issues
anxiety
TRANSITION
Keeping track of symptoms, completing medical history forms and maintaining a calendar for medical appointments were all skills endorsed by the phase 2 participants in this study. In fact, many phase 2 participants described confidence in their capacities related to the TRAQ ‘tracking health issues’ domain. Furthermore, none of the phase 2 participants outlined this as an area of weakness related to their transition readiness (see Figure Joint display of TRAQ tracking health issues subscale results. IQR, interquartile range; TRAQ, Transition Readiness Assessment Questionnaire.To keep track of the variety of symptoms youth were experiencing related to their chronic health and/or mental health conditions, many Phase 2 participants described using organizational tools, including ‘personal health journals’, ‘the MyHealth app’, ‘online tools for medication and symptom tracking’ and ‘calendars for appointment keeping’. These strategies may be particularly useful for individuals with multiple diagnoses; indeed, all nine interview participants endorsed having at least two (and up to eight) diagnoses. The presence of many chronic conditions necessitates the value of organizational tools to manage symptoms, medications and appointments, especially as youth begin taking ownership of their care in preparation for transition to adult services. It is worth noting that all but one interview participant endorsed being diagnosed with anxiety. The slightly higher proportion of individuals with anxiety in phase 2 compared to those in phase 1 could help explain why there is greater confidence in tracking health issues than would be expected based on the phase 1 results. It is also possible that youth in phase 2 had more manageable levels of anxiety and/or developed more adaptive coping strategies for tracking their health issues, specifically, than those in phase 1.The combination of results from phases 1 and 2 regarding tracking health issues indicates that factors including the number of comorbidities, complexity and rarity of one's diagnosis(es), and the severity of mental health symptoms influence the ways in which youth track their symptoms and their comfort level in describing their medical history to providers. Appreciating these multifactorial implications on transition readiness would not have been possible looking at the TRAQ tracking health issues subscale scores in isolation.