are expected to deliver services which achieve the best possible outcomes. The Every Child Matters (ECM) outcomes framework – focusing on the five outcomes of be healthy, stay safe, enjoy and achieve, make a positive contribution and achieve economic well-being – is central to all policy for children. However, it is unclear how these outcomes should be interpreted for disabled children. This re...

The effect of syntactic context on auditory word identification and on the ability to detect and correct syntactic errors in speech was examined in severely reading disabled children and in good and poor readers selected from the normal distribution of fourth graders. The poor readers were handicapped when correct reading required analysis of the sentence context. However, their phonological de...

BACKGROUND The policy of the diminution of the social isolation of the disabled is the main objective of the strategy of the EU new policy concerning the disabled. Lithuanian society faces this objective as well. For this reason, this study aiming at providing the theoretical basis for and predicting the possible psycho-social environment in an integrated education system, as well as at the eva...

It is useful to consider, not only what the birth of a physically handicapped child does to parents, but also what it does to us as professional people. Even though we (doctors, nurses, almoners, psychologists, social workers) are trained in a field where distress and tragedy are part of our daily work, the birth of a very abnormal baby gives us a severe shock, whether we are conscious of it or...

When a disabled child is born all the family's expectations need to be reviewed because it is an unexpected situation and needs the family system to be adjusted to the new situation. Due to the meaning that sibling relations acquire during lifetime, changes in health and functioning of a sibling will affect the others. Relations with a disabled sibling will depend on features of disability as w...

AIM To identify consistency and differences in parental perceptions of impact, need for support and 'sense making' in children with a disability, children with a life-threatening or life-limiting illness and children who are technology dependent. METHOD A series of in-depth semi-structured interviews were undertaken with parents from 33 families that included one or more child with disabiliti...