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Parents’ perspectives on quality in family support programs

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An Erratum to this article was published on 01 June 1996

Abstract

Support services for families who have a member with developmental disabilities are a growing component of many state mental health systems. Family empowerment is a key principle of these programs, but parents and the staff who work with them are often challenged in their efforts to have parents participate in policy development, program management, and evaluation of programs. The use of nominal group techniques is described as a means of identifying factors parents believe characterize quality family support programs. Parents’ identified factors are then compared with factors from a theoretical framework for quality. Parents stressed access to information, adherence to empowerment philosophy, and the importance of interpersonal relationships with staff. Parents placed less emphasis on factors generally found in accreditation criteria.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Services Research Unit, Michigan Department of Mental Health, Lewis Cass Building, 48913, Lansing, MI

    Sandra E. Herman Ph.D. (Senior Program Evaluator)

  2. School of Social Work, Center for Study of Youth Policy, University of Pennsylvania, USA

    Maureen O. Marcenko Ph.D. (associate professor)

  3. Department of Psychology, University of Alaska, USA

    Kelly L. Hazel Ph.D. (assistant professor)

Authors
  1. Sandra E. Herman Ph.D.
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  2. Maureen O. Marcenko Ph.D.
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  3. Kelly L. Hazel Ph.D.
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Additional information

This research was funded in part by Grants 87205, 88205, and 89205 from the Michigan Developmental Disabilities Council. This work was carried out at the Services Research Unit, Michigan Department of Mental Health.

An erratum to this article is available at http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/BF02522310.

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Herman, S.E., Marcenko, M.O. & Hazel, K.L. Parents’ perspectives on quality in family support programs. The Journal of Mental Health Administration 23, 156–169 (1996). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02519107

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