Effects Of Maltreatment On Children And Children - 2057 Words

Every year, within Australia, the number of children who are removed from the care of their parents and placed into government regulated care continues to grow significantly. For these children, maltreatment (or the risk of maltreatment), in the form of abuse or neglect within the family home result in the need for them to be relocated to alternative care arrangements, more commonly referred to as out-of-home care (OOHC). The research which investigates the effects of maltreatment on children, conclusively shows that experiencing trauma and/or neglect during childhood can result in considerable physiological and psychological effects on development across multiple key domains, such as cognitive, social-emotional, academic, and language†¦show more content†¦However, there appears to be a lack of evidentiary information regarding the number of children in OOHC that have been referred and/or accessed speech pathology services to date. Given the lack of information regarding speech pathology referral and access rates for children in OOHC, it is important to gain a better understanding of the level of speech pathology interaction with this population by identify those barriers and/or facilitators which may be hindering or helping speech pathology access for OOHC children. In this regard, the Case Managers and Case Workers assigned with provision of care and services for children in OOHC are considered to be important stakeholders who are well placed within the OOHC system to provide a key perspective of the barriers and facilitators which commonly feature in speech pathology interactions with children in OOHC. When considering what elements may be classified as facilitators and barriers, the World Health Organization’s International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health Children Youth Version (ICF-CY) (World Health Organization, 2007), provides the following definition: The environmental factors that make up the physical, social and attitudinal environment in which people live and conduct their lives. These factors are external to individuals and can have a positive or negative influence on the