FAMILY INTERVENTION IN MENTAL-RETARDATION - AN OVERVIEW

Home-based family care approach in mental retardation (MR) has gained world-wide recognition and research attention especially in the last 2 decades. There are clear advantages to the individual with MR as well as to society in promoting family based care. However, there is a need to work with families to ensure optimum care as well as successful family adaptation. Approaches to such family interventions include parent education and training, parent counselling, family adaptation and interactive/transactional models. There have been some recent attempts in India to develop family-based interventions. There is a need to devise and evaluate comprehensive care models in MR involving the family members.