Effectiveness of a Foster Parent Intervention: Results of a Trial

Study Overview
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Brief Summary
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The hypothesis of the study is that the intervention leads to a reduction in foster children's externalizing problems and foster parents' parenting stress and that this in turn leads to a reduction in the number of breakdowns of foster placements.

Official Title
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Development, Implementation and Evaluation of a Foster Parent Intervention

Conditions
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Problematic Behavior in Children, Parent-child Problem

Intervention / Treatment
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* Behavioral: Foster parent intervention


Participation Criteria
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Eligibility Criteria
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Inclusion Criteria: foster child has a borderline or clinical score on one of the small-band externalizing scales or the broad-band externalizing scale of the Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL) Exclusion Criteria: foster child: has a mental retardation, autism, uses psychotropic medication in an inconsistent way, behavioral problems are the result of medical problems or medication, foster parents: have insufficient knowledge of Dutch, have low cognitive abilities, are already receiving professional support for the foster child's externalizing problems, are divorcing. Moreover, foster placements were excluded if at least two of the following criteria were present: foster parents considered terminating the foster placement during the past two months were experiencing psychological distress (measured with the General Health Questionnaire (GHQ; Koeter & Ormel, 1991) and defined as a score ≥ 2), their foster child had a sum score above 3 (for children < 6 years) or 5 (for children ≥ 6 years) on the critical CBCL-items.

Ages Eligible for Study
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Minimum Age: 3 Years
Maximum Age: 12 Years

Sexes Eligible for Study
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All

Accepts Healthy Volunteers
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Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Study Plan
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How is the study designed?
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Design Details

Primary Purpose: Treatment
Allocation: Randomized
Intervention Model: Parallel Assignment
Masking: None (Open Label)


Arms and Interventions

| Participant Group/Arm | Intervention/Treatment |
| --- | --- |
| Experimental: Behavioral: Foster parent intervention<br>Foster parents receive a foster parent intervention consisting of 10 individual home visits and three group sessions. Duration of the intervention is four months | Behavioral: Foster parent intervention<br>* parent management training for foster parents, consisting of 10 individual home visits and 3 group sessions. Duration is four months<br>|
| No Intervention: Control<br>waiting-list control group who receive care-as-usual | |

What is the study measuring?
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Primary Outcome Measures

| Outcome Measure | Measure Description | Time Frame |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Change in foster child's externalizing problems from baseline to post-intervention (3.5 months later) | T-score for the externalizing subscale of the Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL) | Assessed at two time points: at baseline (before the start of the intervention) en post-intervention (immediately after the intervention has ended, which is on average 3.5 months after the baseline measurement) | 
| Change in foster child's externalizing problems from post-intervention to follow-up (3 months later) | The T-score of the Externalizing scale of the Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL) | Assessed at post-interventio (immediately after the intervention has ended, which is about 3.5 months after the baseline measurement) and at follow-up (which is thee months later than the post-intervention measurement). | 

Secondary Outcome Measures

| Outcome Measure | Measure Description | Time Frame |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Change in foster parent's parenting stress from baseline to post-intervention (3.5 months later) | Nijmegen Questionnaire for the Parenting Situation | Assessed at two time points: at baseline (before the start of the intervention) en post-intervention (immediately after the intervention has ended, which is on average 3.5 months after the baseline measurement) | 
| Change in foster mother's parenting stress from post-intervention to follow-up (3 months later) | The Nijmegen Questionnaire for the parenting situation | Assessed at post-interventio (immediately after the intervention has ended, which is about 3.5 months after the baseline measurement) and at follow-up (which is thee months later than the post-intervention measurement). | 
| Client satisfaction | Dutch Questionaire for client satisfaction and effect | At post-intervention (immediately after the intervention has ended, which is on average 3.5 months later than the baseline measurment | 
| Change in foster mother's parenting behavior from baseline to post-intervention (3.5 months later) | The Ghent Parenting Behavior Scale | Assessed at two time points: at baseline (before the start of the intervention) en post-intervention (immediately after the intervention has ended, which is on average 3.5 months after the baseline measurement) |