Key Factors for Success
Service Content
- Start early - initiate services prenatally or as soon as possible after birth
- Standardized Assessment tool - use to identify families who are most in need of services
- Voluntary participation - offer services using positive and creative efforts to build family trust
Program Content
- Consistency - offer intensive services (at least once a week) with well- defined criteria for increasing or decreasing frequency of home visits over the long term (i.e. three to five years)
- Cultural considerations - acknowledge and respect linguistic, geographic, racial and ethnic diversity of the population served
- Parental support - focus on enhancing parents' competencies, parent-child interaction and fostering healthy childhood development
- Medical links - connect families to a medical provider to ensure optimal parent and child health and development.
- Community resources - provide links that further enhance the opportunities for healthy growth and development of the baby and the family as a whole. Assist parents in finding programs, school readiness programs, AADAC programs and domestic violence shelters.
- Manageable caseloads - limit staff case loads to ensure that home visitors have adequate time to spend with each family (i.e. maximum 10-15 families at most intensive service level).
Selection and Training of Service Providers
- Service providers - with appropriate personal characteristics (non-judgmental, compassionate, humour), experience, skill sets and willingness to work with a diverse range of people
- Basic training - a basic training framework that supports families to face multiple challenges. Culturally appropriate ongoing training with an emphasis on child development, positive family support and parenting skill development
- Intensive Training - essential components of family assessment and home visitation
- Supervision - reflective supervision supports effective home visitation intervention to promote family's goal attainment and to avoid staff stress-related burnout of staff.
- Family Violence Protocol Implementation and training workshop (Peace River) (27 day)
- AHVNA Network meeting (Red Deer) (30 day)
- AHVNA Family Violence Protocol (Red Deer) (40 day)
- Developmental Parenting and PICCOLO (Edmonton) (63 day)
- Motivational Interviewing Level 1 (Calgary) (64 day)
- HOVRS in Practice training workshop (Edmonton) (65 day)
- Developmental Parenting and PICCOLO (Calgary) (68 day)
- Motivational Interviewing Level 1 (Edmonton) (69 day)
- HOVRS in Practice training workshop (Calgary) (70 day)
- Family Violence Protocol Implementation and Training workshop (Edmonton) (71 day)