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Kathleen M. Hebbeler, PhD, Center for Education and Human Services, SRI International, 600 Mockingbird Place, Davis, CA 95616, 530-758-7483, Kathleen.Hebbeler@sri.com, Rune J. Simeonsson, PhD, Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, CB #8185, UNC-Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC 27599-8185, and Anita A. Scarborough, PhD, Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute, University of North Carolina, CB 8185, Chapel Hill, NC 27599-8185.
The provision of early intervention services to infants and toddlers with developmental delays and disabilities is mandated by Part C of the IDEA legislation. However, neither eligibility definitions nor terms used to describe disability in very young children have been standardized, taxing the capacity of researchers and providers to describe child functioning and to meaningfully communicate changes in child functioning over time. This presentation will describe the results of a project that used the dimensions of child functioning as described in the recently developed International Classification of Functioning (ICF) from the World Health Organization to provide a comprehensive description of functional characteristics of young children with disabilities. The National Early Intervention Longitudinal Study (NEILS), the first national study of early intervention provided under the auspices of Part C of IDEA, is following the progress of 3,338 children under three years of age with disabilities and developmental delays. Algorithms were developed to convert information available in NEILS on child functioning to ICF codes. The presentation will describe the information collected through NEILS, the algorithms developed, and the dimensions of functioning coded to the ICF. Findings will include a description of the US population of infants and toddlers being served through Part C in terms of these functional markers. To portray functionally how children participating in early intervention change over time, the study compared ICF functional markers at entry to early intervention services and at 36 months of age and these findings will also be presented.
Learning Objectives:
Presenting author's disclosure statement:
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.