Abstract
Residential treatment, perceptions and experiences of young people admitted to a remedial treatment centre for young people with mild intellectual disabilities A considerable number young people with mild intellectual disabilities receive assistance from a remedial treatment centre for young people with mild intellectual disabilities. It has been shown, through research
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that a good working relationship between the young people and the care workers is one of the effective factors in their treatment. With this in mind it is important to find out what young people with a mild intellectual disability think about their stay in a remedial treatment centre. The experiences of these young people are the subject of this thesis. How does a young person with a mild intellectual disability, admitted to a remedial treatment centre experience his or her stay there and 2. Does the description of the experiences of the young people correspond with this experiences described by their parents, their assigned group worker and the therapist directly involved in their treatment?. After the research design and the research process is presented, follows a report on the research into the topics the young people with a mild intellectual disability find important when answering the question "what do you think about living in residential care?" These topics are collected by means of focus group interviews. With the help of the, in the framework of this research developed, method "collaboration" there were eight young people with mild intellectual disabilities trained to interview their peers. Parents, the assigned group workers and the therapists of the young people were also interviewed. Of all the 150 young people of twelve years and older from one specific remedial treatment centre in the south of the Netherlands , twenty-one young people and their parents eventually agreed to take part in the interview. Approximately half of the young people interviewed judged their stay as "nice and not nice". From the other half one quarter of the young people judged their stay to be "nice" and half one quarter as "not nice". Young people came in two ways to this decision. Firstly on the basis of a prior judgement, whereby a position taken previously affects the answer given leaving little or no space for the direct experiences that could influence the judgement. Data analysis shows that parents and therapists have a reasonable idea of how the young people experience their stay in a remedial treatment centre in general. Assigned group workers see this a little less clear. But if we look at the similarities in the answers to the questions on the diverse topics then only a slight to moderate similarity can be seen. The recommendation is made that in daily practice more time is taken to explore the experiences of the young people. On the basis of this knowledge a collectively formulated care treatment plan can be made and support and treatment can be executed more effectively.
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