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Paper

Residential treatment, perceptions and experiences of young people admitted to a remedial treatment centre for young people with mild intellectual disabilities

• issue: Issue 1 / 2009
• authors: Xavier M.H. Moonen
• keywords: disability, Residential, experiences, The Netherlands

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• downloaded: 0
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abstract

Background and research questions. Every year in the Netherlands there is an increasing number of young people with mild intellectual disabilities referred for help from social care. Approximately 3500 young people are treated annually in residential remedial treatment centres for young people with mild intellectual disabilities. There is relatively little known about the treatment processes in these centres. It has been shown, through research that a good working relationship between the young people and the care workers is one of the effective factors in their treatment. With this in mind it is important to find out what young people with a mild intellectual disability think about their stay in a remedial treatment centre. Until now there has been no research into the experiences of young people with mild intellectual disabilities admitted to a remedial treatment centre. The central question of this research is twofold:

• how does a young person with a mild intellectual disability, admitted to a remedial treatment centre experience his or her stay there and
• does the description of the experiences of the young people correspond with this experiences described by their parents, their assigned group worker and the therapist directly involved in their treatment?

Method. The research design is based on a mixed method design. Research was done into the topics these young people find important when answering the question "what do you think about living in residential care?" These topics were collected by means of four focus group interviews. On the basis of these, and other topics gathered from the young people in the target group an interview handbook developed. There are four interview topics involved: "tell us something about your live until now", "how do you experience your stay in the residential centre", "what do you think will your live look like in one year from now" and finally "what do you think will your live look like in five year from now". With the help of the, in the framework of this research developed, method "colla­boration" there were eight young people with mild intellectual disabilities trained to interview their peers. As well as these eight young people, there were five students, with the help of the same method, trained to interview the parents, the assigned group workers and the therapists of the young people being interviewed.

Findings and implications. Of all the 150 young people of twelve years and older from one specific remedial treatment centre in the south of the Netherlands, who received a written invitation to take part in this research, twenty-one young people and their parents eventually agreed to take part in the interview. Evidence will be presented that shows that the characteristics of these twenty-one participants are not different from the total population. The experiences of the twenty-one young people with a mild intellectual disability that were interviewed were analysed by using the Maxqda program. For this a work model was used that places the evaluation of the experiences of the young people in an ecological context. Young people judge their stay in three categories named by them as "not nice","nice" and "nice and not nice". Subsequently the answers to the questions on the diverse topics are discussed with each young person. There can be no relationship shown between the legal status of the young persons (who referred to treatment with or without an supervision order), their sex or the timing of the interview and the way in which the young persons have judged their stay. The young people gave very individual ans­wers to the questions asked about the topics.

Approximately half of the young people interviewed judged their stay as "nice and not nice". From the other half one quarter of the young people judged their stay to be "nice" and half one quarter as "not nice".(see table 1). Young people came in two ways to this decision. Firstly on the basis of a prior judgement, whereby a position taken previously affects the answer given leaving little or no space for the direct experiences that could influence the judgement. Secondly on the basis of an assessment whereby the experiences surrounding several topics are weighed up by the young people. Hereafter the question was answered: "do the experiences of young people admitted to a remedial treatment centre correspond to the vision the parents, assigned group workers and the thera­pists directly involved in their treatment have of those experiences?" A comparison was made among 15 young people and their parents, assigned group workers and therapists. In only 4 cases there was a total agreement of the experiences of the young people and the judgment of that experience by the parents, the assigned group workers and the therapists (see table 2). Parents and therapists have a reasonable idea of the overall view of the young people. But parents, assigned group workers and therapists have a slight to moderately accurate view of the answers from the young people on the different interview topics.

It can be concluded that there is often a question of multiple contact whereby the young people and their parents, the assigned group workers and the therapists on the basis of their own, individual, considerations form an impression of the stay in the treatment centre without sharing it. The recommendation is made that in daily practice more time is taken to explore the experiences of the young people together. On the basis of this knowledge a collectively formulated care treatment plan can be made and support and treatment can be executed more effectively.

Tab. 1 - Experiences of the young person and the ideas the parents, assigned group workers and therapists had about this experiences

Tab. 2 - Level of agreement between the young person and his parent, the assigned group worker and the therapist

Key references

Becker, H., Roberts, G., Morrison, J., & Silver, J. (2004). Recruiting people with disabilities as research participant: challenges and strategies to address them. Mental Retardation, 42, 471-475.

Bonham, G. S., Basehart, S., Schalock, R. L., Marchand, C. B., Kirchner, N., & Rumenap, J. M. (2004). Consumer-based quality of life assessment: the Maryland As Me! Project. Mental Retardation, 42, 338-355.

Moonen, X. M. H. (2007). Verblijf, beeld en ervaringen van jongeren opgenomen in een orthopedagogisch centrum voor jeugdigen met een lichte verstandelijke beperking. Maastricht, Datawyse.

Contacts: Xavier M.H. Moonen, Koraal Groep, Valkstraat 14, 6135 GC Sittard, the Netherlands, E-mail: xmoonen@koraalgroep.nl, Phone 0031655107583.