Whether it is being able to take your kid to a dentist or feeling confident of a safe childbirth, the color of your skin or thickness of your wallet may make a difference in your family's health services.

Parents are struggling with the demands of rearing young children under considerable financial and time pressures concludes a Commonwealth Fund national survey. Parents are looking for more information, services, and attention from doctors on how they can help their children thrive and learn during the critically important first years. Read more about parents' experience with infants and toddlers and how these findings will help inform a national initiative—Healthy Steps for Young Children.

Healthy Steps offers a new approach to pediatric health by focusing on the physical, psychological, emotional, and intellectual growth and development of children from birth to age three. Learn more about how local initiatives will work to encourage strong relationships between existing pediatric practices and parents.

Bright Futures: Guidelines for Health Supervision of Infants, Children, and Adolescents offers health professionals guidelines that view health in the big picture—physical well-being, mental health, cognitive development, and social efficacy. Learn more about these guidelines developed by the Maternal and Child Health Bureau, the Medicaid Bureau, and the American Academy of Pediatrics and find out how they are being implemented.

When will your child need her shots? Where is your nearest clinic? How many shots does a child need? Find out from the Center for Disease Control's Web site or call the National Immunization Information Hotline, 1-800-232-2522 (or 1-800-232-0233 for Latino/Hispanic services).

Overall spending on health care will double by 2007, rising from $1 trillion in 1996 to $2.1 trillion in 2007, according to a 1998 study issued by the Health Care Financing Administration (HCFA). Children are the first to pay the price when health care costs go up, as employers drop dependent coverage and families find it hard to make up the difference.