Respite Care Services for Families Who Adopt Children With Special Needs
A Synthesis of Demonstration Program Final Reports (4/02)
Post-adoption services are essential to support families who have adopted children with special needs, especially medically fragile children and children with physical or emotional disorders. One of these services is respite care - temporary care for the children that can provide a break for the families from the daily demands of caring for their children or respite during times of emergencies.
To enhance and expand respite care services, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has periodically selected Respite Care Services for Families Who Adopt Children with Special Needs as one of the priority areas for funding in its annual Adoption Opportunities discretionary grants programs. Nineteen respite care projects were funded in this priority area in 1990, 1991, 1994, and 1995. Other respite care projects have also been funded under the priority areas of Post Legal Adoption Services and Field Initiated Demonstration Projects.
To share the knowledge gained from these projects with others in the field, this report synthesizes information from the final program and evaluation reports of 8 of the 19 projects. The information presented here was current at the time these reports were written between 1994 and 1999. Project descriptions, challenges and lessons learned, accomplishments, and recommendations are summarized in the following sections.
Credits: Child Welfare Information Gateway (http://www.childwelfare.gov)
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