Bridging the Divides Among Healthcare Delivery, Family, and Educational Settings

There is gulf between initial diagnosis of intellectual disabilities, treatment, and intersystem approaches to education, treatment, and service delivery. Often physicians are not informed regarding how well a child integrates into school or how medical treatments affect learning and behaviour. Likewise, educators are often unaware of treatment regimens, changes to treatment, medications and their side effects, and prognosis and course of disease and disorders. The family is often equally uninformed of what physicians or schools are doing. The school psychologist and educational team can connect all these important individuals into a collaborative problem-solving unit, where information can be easily shared and treatment strategies can be best tailored to each person’s unique challenges. In this chapter, strategies unique to families with people with intellectual disabilities are shared that help streamline services and optimize treatments.