Early Intervention
Early Intervention (EI) is the identification of children who are at risk of delays in their development. An intervention team will then work with the parents and ensure they, and the child, are provided suitable resources to maximise the child's physical, cognitive, and social/emotional development.
There are different ways in which a child’s development can be enhanced at an early age.
The benefits of Early Intervention
Children who:
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Are delayed in one or more age-appropriate milestones
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Have a diagnosis of a condition that can result in delays
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Are at risk of delay
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Have disordered or atypical development
Team Reviews
A team review is held to ascertain a child’s development level.
The comprehensive review includes looking at the child’s skill level in the different areas of development (social and emotional, physical, cognitive, language and adaptive living) and also identifying signs of a disordered developmental profile.
For some children, the need for early intervention is more obvious; this is seen with significant prematurity, low birth weight, or the presence of a specific condition like Cerebral Palsy or Down Syndrome.
Eligibility for intervention is based on a team assessment, as some children are just maturing at a different rate, and do not have delays when compared with peers.
If your child is at risk of delay already has delays in critical areas of development, then the options are explained very carefully and your child’s paediatrician will need to have details of the result of the skills
assessment so that medical follow up can be arranged.
Early Intervention Services
The following is a list of what early intervention we can provide:
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Assisting technology devices and services - equipment and services that are used to improve or maintain the abilities of a child to participate in such activities as playing, communication, eating or moving.
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Audiology - identifying and providing services for children with hearing loss and prevention of hearing loss.
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Family training - services provided by qualified personnel to assist the family in understanding the special needs of the child and in promoting the child’s development.
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Nutrition services - studying feeding skills, feeding problems, habits and food preferences.
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Occupational Therapy - services that relate to self-help skills, adaptive behavior and play, and sensory, motor, and postural development.
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Parent training; parenting education
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Physical Therapy - services to prevent or lessen movement’s difficulties and related functional problems.
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Psychological services - administering and interpreting psychological tests and information about a child’s behavior and child and family conditions related to learning, mental health and development as well as planning services including counseling, consultation, parent training, and education programs.
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Service coordination - someone who works in partnership with the family by providing assistance and support services that help the family to coordinate their childs needs
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Social work services - preparing an assessment of the social and emotional strengths and needs of a child and family, and providing individual or group services such as counseling or family training.
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Special instruction - includes designing learning environments and activities that promote the child’s development, providing families with information, skills, and support to enhance the child’s development.
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Speech-language pathology - services for children with delay in communication skills or with motor skills such as weakness of muscles around the mouth or swallowing.
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Therapeutic early childhood classrooms, providing developmentally appropriate learning environments, and staffed by trained Early Interventionists
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Vision services - identification of children with visual disorders or delays and providing services and training to those children
Child Development Milestones (Birth to Three years)
In order to assist in our assessments and development of Intervention Programme we we request feedback on a diverse range of standard development milestones, including the childs achievements:
