Melissa Gonzalez, Catherine Rama, Aria Nawab, Emily Robertson, Paulina Maria Partridge, Arielle Ashkenazi, Elana Mansoor, Julie Van Weelden, Kristyna Peña, Ruby A. Natale
{"title":"Providing Virtual Support to Children With Mild Developmental Delays in Response to the Pandemic","authors":"Melissa Gonzalez, Catherine Rama, Aria Nawab, Emily Robertson, Paulina Maria Partridge, Arielle Ashkenazi, Elana Mansoor, Julie Van Weelden, Kristyna Peña, Ruby A. Natale","doi":"10.1097/IYC.0000000000000243","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"The COVID-19 pandemic has had massive impacts across the globe. Children with developmental delays are an increasingly vulnerable population, highlighting the importance of ensuring they have access to high-quality virtual services during this time. The Early Discovery program currently provides therapeutic interventions for children with mild developmental delays. We sought to compare the outcomes of 2 cohorts within the Early Discovery program using different delivery approaches (n = 238 families): children who received services in person before the pandemic (n = 126) and children who received services via telehealth in the acute phase of the pandemic (n = 112). Both groups of children showed significant improvements in language skills posttreatment, and, with regard to auditory comprehension, both groups showed similar rates of improvement. However, children receiving in-person services before the pandemic showed greater improvements in expressive communication skills than children receiving telehealth services during the pandemic. Results indicate that the Early Discovery program was able to make adjustments during the pandemic that assisted families in maintaining progress in improving their child's language skills.","PeriodicalId":47099,"journal":{"name":"Infants & Young Children","volume":"7 1","pages":"195 - 210"},"PeriodicalIF":1.1000,"publicationDate":"2023-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Infants & Young Children","FirstCategoryId":"3","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1097/IYC.0000000000000243","RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q3","JCRName":"EDUCATION, SPECIAL","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
The COVID-19 pandemic has had massive impacts across the globe. Children with developmental delays are an increasingly vulnerable population, highlighting the importance of ensuring they have access to high-quality virtual services during this time. The Early Discovery program currently provides therapeutic interventions for children with mild developmental delays. We sought to compare the outcomes of 2 cohorts within the Early Discovery program using different delivery approaches (n = 238 families): children who received services in person before the pandemic (n = 126) and children who received services via telehealth in the acute phase of the pandemic (n = 112). Both groups of children showed significant improvements in language skills posttreatment, and, with regard to auditory comprehension, both groups showed similar rates of improvement. However, children receiving in-person services before the pandemic showed greater improvements in expressive communication skills than children receiving telehealth services during the pandemic. Results indicate that the Early Discovery program was able to make adjustments during the pandemic that assisted families in maintaining progress in improving their child's language skills.
期刊介绍:
Infants & Young Children is an interdisciplinary journal focusing on vulnerable children from birth to five years of age and their families. Of special interest are articles involving innovative interventions, summaries of important research developments and their implications for practice, updates for high priority topic areas, balanced presentations of controversial issues, and articles that address issues involving policy, professional training, new conceptual models, and related matters. Although data are often presented primarily to illustrate points, some types of data-based articles may be appropriate.