Family support refers to services provided to help families keep a member with a disability at home.
Family support services can help eliminate some of the stress that families experience in trying to meet the unique needs of a family member with mental retardation. Providing supports for children with disabilities in their natural homes helps maintain their quality of life. It also may cost society less to let the family supply the residence and supports that are normally provided by a family. In the seventies, a movement toward deinstitution-alization began. Parents of children with disabilities began to raise their children at home instead of placing them in institutions.