Effectiveness of a Foster Parent Intervention: Results of a Trial (PVO)

Development, Implementation and Evaluation of a Foster Parent Intervention

The hypothesis of the study is that the intervention leads to a reduction in foster children's externalizing problems and foster parents' parenting stress and that this in turn leads to a reduction in the number of breakdowns of foster placements.

Study Overview

• Status: Unknown
• Conditions: Parent-child Problem; Problematic Behavior in Children
• Intervention / Treatment: Behavioral: Foster parent intervention

• Study Type: Interventional
• Enrollment (Actual): 63
• Phase: Not Applicable

Contacts and Locations

Study Locations

• Belgium
  • Vlaams-Brabant
    • Brussel, Vlaams-Brabant, Belgium, 1050
      • Vrije Universiteit Brussel

Participation Criteria

Eligibility Criteria

• Ages Eligible for Study: 3 years to 12 years (CHILD)
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: Yes
• Genders Eligible for Study: All

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

• foster child has a borderline or clinical score on one of the small-band externalizing scales or the broad-band externalizing scale of the Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL)

Exclusion Criteria:

foster child:

• has a mental retardation,
• autism,
• uses psychotropic medication in an inconsistent way,
• behavioral problems are the result of medical problems or medication, foster parents:
• have insufficient knowledge of Dutch,
• have low cognitive abilities,
• are already receiving professional support for the foster child's externalizing problems,
• are divorcing.

Moreover, foster placements were excluded if at least two of the following criteria were present:

• foster parents considered terminating the foster placement during the past two months
• were experiencing psychological distress (measured with the General Health Questionnaire (GHQ; Koeter & Ormel, 1991) and defined as a score ≥ 2),
• their foster child had a sum score above 3 (for children < 6 years) or 5 (for children ≥ 6 years) on the critical CBCL-items.

Study Plan

How is the study designed?

Design Details

• Primary Purpose: TREATMENT
• Allocation: RANDOMIZED
• Interventional Model: PARALLEL
• Masking: NONE

Number of Arms

2

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm	Intervention / Treatment
EXPERIMENTAL: Behavioral: Foster parent intervention; Foster parents receive a foster parent intervention consisting of 10 individual home visits and three group sessions. Duration of the intervention is four months	Behavioral: Foster parent intervention; parent management training for foster parents, consisting of 10 individual home visits and 3 group sessions. Duration is four months
NO_INTERVENTION: Control; waiting-list control group who receive care-as-usual

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Change in foster child's externalizing problems from baseline to post-intervention (3.5 months later)	T-score for the externalizing subscale of the Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL)	Assessed at two time points: at baseline (before the start of the intervention) en post-intervention (immediately after the intervention has ended, which is on average 3.5 months after the baseline measurement)
Change in foster child's externalizing problems from post-intervention to follow-up (3 months later)	The T-score of the Externalizing scale of the Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL)	Assessed at post-interventio (immediately after the intervention has ended, which is about 3.5 months after the baseline measurement) and at follow-up (which is thee months later than the post-intervention measurement).

Secondary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Change in foster parent's parenting stress from baseline to post-intervention (3.5 months later)	Nijmegen Questionnaire for the Parenting Situation	Assessed at two time points: at baseline (before the start of the intervention) en post-intervention (immediately after the intervention has ended, which is on average 3.5 months after the baseline measurement)
Change in foster mother's parenting stress from post-intervention to follow-up (3 months later)	The Nijmegen Questionnaire for the parenting situation	Assessed at post-interventio (immediately after the intervention has ended, which is about 3.5 months after the baseline measurement) and at follow-up (which is thee months later than the post-intervention measurement).
Client satisfaction	Dutch Questionaire for client satisfaction and effect	At post-intervention (immediately after the intervention has ended, which is on average 3.5 months later than the baseline measurment
Change in foster mother's parenting behavior from baseline to post-intervention (3.5 months later)	The Ghent Parenting Behavior Scale	Assessed at two time points: at baseline (before the start of the intervention) en post-intervention (immediately after the intervention has ended, which is on average 3.5 months after the baseline measurement)

Collaborators and Investigators

• Sponsor: Vrije Universiteit Brussel

Study record dates

Study Major Dates

• Study Start: January 1, 2011
• Primary Completion (ANTICIPATED): May 1, 2013
• Study Completion (ANTICIPATED): May 1, 2013

Study Registration Dates

• First Submitted: February 19, 2013
• First Submitted That Met QC Criteria: March 29, 2013
• First Posted (ESTIMATE): April 1, 2013

Study Record Updates

• Last Update Posted (ESTIMATE): April 5, 2013
• Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria: April 4, 2013
• Last Verified: April 1, 2013

More Information

Terms related to this study

• Other Study ID Numbers: ID0032