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Q: How can I obtain the Rourke Baby Record?

The Rourke Baby Record (RBR) is freely available for downloading and printing on our website.

Q: Who can use the Rourke Baby Record?

Anyone can use the Rourke Baby Record although the content is developed in a Canadian context and targeted for use by Canadian clinicians and families.

The RBR was originally designed to be used by physicians, healthcare teachers and learners, nurse practitioners, community/public health nurses, and other primary health care providers who care for infants and children.

Parents and caregivers can also find reliable resources on the RBR website:

  1. RBR Well baby/Well child Information sheets answer questions on feeding, safety, development, vaccination, and other common issues relevant for babies and young children at specific ages.
  2. RBR Resource links for parents include trustworthy information researched and reviewed by paediatric healthcare professionals. They can be filtered by age or topic, or through a search function.

Q: How do I use the Rourke Baby Record and its website?

The Rourke Baby Record (RBR GUIDES and NOTES) can be used by healthcare providers in many ways, including:

  • To serve as an aide memoire and a reliable source for current knowledge on paediatric preventive health issues.
  • To provide parents/caregivers with trustworthy evidence-informed resources.
  • To document/chart each well baby/well child visit.
  • To teach the components of a comprehensive well baby/well child visit.
  • To facilitate team-based care models using a standard approach and common standardized documents.
  • To share with consultants as a concise summary of a child’s preventive care.

The Rourke Baby Record website is mobile device friendly and contains many useful features, including:

  1. Downloads of various formats of the RBR GUIDES/NOTES.
  2. RBR Interactive GUIDES for primary healthcare providers: These are accompanied by the NOTES/Evidence summary and provide expanded information and resources associated with each topic listed in the GUIDES.
  3. Age-specific RBR Well Baby/Child Information Sheets for parents/caregivers.
  4. Parent Resource Links to reliable information on common issues.
  5. Background About the RBR development and evolution: Introduction, Authors, Keeping the RBR Current, Literature reviewed, Prior RBR editions, RBR adaptations, FAQs.
  6. Disclaimer and Fair Use Authorization
  7. Support and Acknowledgements

Q: Is the Rourke Baby Record available in electronic medical record (EMR) format?

Many software firms have adapted the Rourke Baby Record for EMR format. A license agreement is available to allow these adaptations. These agreements provide the EMR companies with the RBR free of charge. It is a licence requirement and the responsibility of the EMR companies to incorporate the most recent RBR edition. Please contact your EMR company to ensure that they have the most recent RBR edition available to you. For further info and details, please contact Dr. Leslie Rourke. (lrourke@mun.ca).

Q: Is the Rourke Baby Record available in French?

Each updated edition of the RBR is professionally translated into French. The French National and Ontario versions of the Rourke Baby Record are available in various formats in the Downloads section of this website. The RBR has not yet been translated into other languages.

Q: Are there other versions of the Rourke Baby Record?

Ontario: The Government of Ontario has funded the development and updating of the Rourke Baby Record since 2005.

An Ontario version of the Rourke Baby Record is available on this website in the Downloads section.

In the Prior RBR Editions section of this website (found in the About tab on the top menu), a “Teal” version of the ONTARIO RBR shows changes from the prior ONTARIO edition in teal coloured print, and a “Red” version shows the differences from the current NATIONAL RBR.

RBR Adaptations are included in this section of our website (https://www.rourkebabyrecord.ca/other-initiatives) and on specific websites:

Q: What organizations have endorsed the Rourke Baby Record?

The Rourke Baby Record is affiliated with the College of Family Physicians of Canada (CFPC) and the Canadian Paediatric Society (CPS), and is endorsed by the CPS, CFPC, and Dietitians of Canada.

Q: How is the Rourke Baby Record funded?

The Rourke Baby Record is freely available, and no royalties are received.

The Government of Ontario has funded the development and updating of the Rourke Baby Record since 2005.

In kind contributions have been received from the Canadian Paediatric Society, the College of Family Physicians of Canada, Dietitians of Canada, and Memorial University of Newfoundland.

Financial contributions to support ongoing RBR development projects are welcome and can be directed to the Memorial University of Newfoundland Rourke Baby Record Research and Development Fund: Attention to Director of Administration, Office of Finance Faculty of Medicine, Medical Education Centre, 300 Prince Philip Drive, St. John’s NL A1B 3V6. All contributions will be acknowledged. Prior to 2018, contributions were received from OKAKI Health Intelligence Inc., Telus, and AccelEMR.

Q: Has the Rourke Baby Record been validated?

Research on the use of, satisfaction with, and criterion validity of the Rourke Baby Record was published as follows:

Rourke L, Godwin M, Rourke J, Pearce S, Bean J. The Rourke Baby Record Infant/Child Maintenance Guide: do doctors use it, do they find it useful, and does using it improve their well-baby visit records? BMC Family Practice 2009, 10:28 doi:10.1186/1471-2296-10-28 http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2296/10/28

Q: How does the current edition of the Rourke Baby Record differ from the prior edition?

The list of the main changes, and a “Teal” version of the Rourke Baby Record with changes from the prior edition shown in teal coloured print are available on this website in the Prior RBR Editions section. It is found in the About tab on the top menu.

Q: How is information chosen for inclusion in the Rourke Baby Record?

Items are chosen based on:

  1. evidence (impact on health from 0 – 5 years)
  2. effectiveness and importance (improving outcomes) and
  3. efficiency (practical to apply and prioritize)

The RBR team has engaged the services and expertise of the McMaster Evidence Review & Synthesis Team (MERST) since 2018 for epidemiologic surveillance, critical review, and documentation of the literature.

Q: What is the Methodology for collecting and appraising the literature, and for determining level of evidence and strength of recommendation?

For the 2024 edition of the RBR, the literature search strategy, selection of relevant studies, and a methodology review of each relevant study was conducted by McMaster Evidence Review and Synthesis Team (MERST), McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario.

A modified Shekelle approach was then used for the critical appraisal of the literature. Shekelle PG, Woolf SH, Eccles M, Grimshaw J. Clinical guidelines: developing guidelines. BMJ. 1999 Feb 27;318(7183):593-6. doi: 10.1136/bmj.318.7183.593. PMID: 10037645; PMCID: PMC1115034.) (Dan, please replace with live link.)

Further details can be found in the Literature Reviewed page. The level of evidence was then accordingly assigned, establishing the strength of recommendation for each RBR item, which is reflected on the RBR GUIDES/NOTES using the longstanding and clinician-friendly print designation of Good, Fair, and Inconclusive evidence/Consensus.

The draft content revisions for the 2024 edition of the RBR edition were subsequently subjected to extensive external review by the endorsing organizations and key stakeholders prior to its endorsement and release.

We thank and congratulate RBR Executive members Dr. Imaan Bayoumi (Associate Professor and Research Director of Family Medicine Queens University), and Dr. Patricia Li (Clinician Scientist and Associate Professor of Paediatrics McGill University) for their expertise in taking the lead with this huge methodological task.

We also thank Donna Fitzpatrick-Lewis (MSW), Ruth Lewis (BA), and Diana Sherifali (RN, PhD, CDE) from MERST for their excellent collaboration.

Q: When assessing the development of an infant or young child, what is the difference between developmental screening, developmental surveillance, and case finding. What type of development tool is the RBR?

  • Development Screening: The use of a standardized tool to search for developmental delay in asymptomatic populations.
  • Developmental Surveillance: The ongoing monitoring of development, identification of risk factors and elicitation of parental and caregiver concerns.
  • Case finding: Identification of developmental delay in populations that are at increased risk of developmental delays.

The RBR uses broad developmental surveillance. Health care providers observe and ask parents about their child’s acquisition of developmental milestones using a list of predefined items. These items have been selected from various validated developmental surveillance tools from the literature. Items are set after the time of typical milestone acquisition. Thus, failure to achieve these developmental milestones, loss of attained milestones, or parental, caregiver, or clinician concern about the child’s development suggest the need for further evaluation of development, which may involve the use of a standardized screening tool and/or a referral to a consultant. Parental familiarity with particular milestones may be culturally dependent.