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Parents' Views of Psychological Services for Children With a Disability

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 February 2012

Tim Connell  and
Violetta Hodges
Tim Connell*
Affiliation:
Disability SA and Novita Children's Services, Adelaide, Australia. tim.connell@dfc.sa.gov.au
Violetta Hodges
Affiliation:
Disability SA and Novita Children's Services, Adelaide, Australia.
*
*Address for correspondence: Tim Connell, Disability SA, 11 Blacks Road, Gilles Plains SA 5086, Australia.
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Abstract

The greater risk of mental health issues for all members of a family when a child has a physical disability is well established. Families' views of the type of psychological services that will be most helpful were surveyed. Parents of 69 children with physical disabilities (primarily cerebral palsy) completed a postal survey of psychological issues they had experienced in the past, value of any help received, and their descriptions of experiences with support workers that were either helpful or unhelpful to their psychological coping. Parents indicated strongly that the help for the psychological issues was helpful. Of all categories of support worker identified, the percentage of psychologists being helpful was highest. One distinctive quality of the parent-identified features of effective support services reported in this study is their simplicity. Parents want to be supported by workers who are caring, do their jobs well, provide good information about the issues and help them connect with other families.

Keywords

parents of children with cerebral palsypsychological serviceshelpful support servicesunhelpful support services
Type
Articles
Information
The Educational and Developmental Psychologist , Volume 26 , Issue 2 , 01 December 2009 , pp. 127 - 137
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2009

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