|
We believe in providing the best services to children and families we serve. Some children require specialized and intensive care, and additional protection. This is why we introduced these programs to augment our mandated services.
These programs include our Family Support and High Risk Infant Nurse programs, and our on-site Health Clinic.
The Family Support Program
The Family Support Program promotes the well being of children in their homes, and assists in the reintegration of children to their families.
Goals of the program include:
- Developing the family’s parenting and life skills.
- Improving caretaker skills through teaching, counselling, contracting, goal setting and action plans.
- Enhance the functioning of the family.
- Providing the most appropriate intervention plan to help the child, and ensuring his/her safety.
- Successfully maintaining the child/children at home.
- Successfully reintegrating the child/children into the family.
Criteria for involvement:
- Children must be between the ages of 2 and 16 years.
- At least one parent must be motivated and willing to work with the family support workers.
- The parent(s) must show a desire to plan for their child/children’s return to their care.
Role of the Family Support Worker
The Family Support worker works with the child and the family for a brief time period (up to 16 weeks). This will include assessing child management practices.
The worker, along with family members, identifies concerns of the family, and sets up an intervention plan that is goal-oriented and solution focused.
The worker will also refer families to appropriate services in the community, and advocate for them as needed.
The program helps us plan for children in care with their own families in a way that is guided by the goals of permanency and stability.
[ top ]
The High Risk Infant Nurse Program
Durham CAS is a leader in Ontario with our High Risk Infant Nurse program.
The program was established in 1997 with one nurse, and expanded over the years. We now have four highly skilled nurses who are a great complement to our social work staff.
The program enhances our ability to identify medical risks in infants. The nurses work with infants in the community as well as those in CAS care.
The expertise of our nurses address the specialized needs of infants.
Our nurses work with infants from birth to two years of age. They provide physical assessments and intensive monitoring for the high-risk infant living with his or her family or guardian.
Goals of the program include:
- Assessing the physical and developmental condition of the infant.
- Assessing the caretaking skills of the parents.
- Assisting parents through teaching, counseling and goal setting.
- Monitoring the physical and developmental needs of the infant.
Additional Services
The nurses provide a range of additional services, including:
- Supporting our Supervised Access Centre
- Supporting foster parents
- Training staff and foster parents
- Assisting other CASs to establish their own programs
- Assisting with our Health Clinic
- Collaborating with other community agencies to provide optimum care for infants in Durham Region
On-site Health Clinic
Our in-house health clinic provides a range of medical services for children in CAS care as well as children in the community who are receiving mandated services from the Society.
Our goals are:
- To ensure the provision of medical services to children.
- To enrich service delivery to children.
[ top ]
|
