Helping Families Stay Together – Intensive Family Preservation
In a web of acronyms, across Wheeler’s continuum of care, are dozens of grant-funded community-based programs, all unique but largely centered on a common theme: helping at-risk families stay together and thrive at home.
Hundreds of Wheeler staff work in these specific programs, serving hundreds more families every day, who are generally referred to Wheeler through the Connecticut Department of Children and Families (DCF), which funds and closely works with staff in each program. The teams are, broadly, non-clinical, and their work focuses more on connections for the families they serve…for help, housing, health care, and resources that help them thrive.
They do similar work in each program, but they work in different ways. All are time-limited; they are not intended to be long-term solutions by themselves. And one common thread remains…the programs focus on the unique strengths within the family, and they all aim to show families that they themselves have what they need to grow, as each family, even those referred to Wheeler by DCF because of abuse or neglect, are strong in their own ways.
“They say it takes a village to raise a child, but every family’s village is different,” say Tabor Napiello, LMSW, program manager of one of the programs, Care Coordination. One other program in Wheeler’s continuum to help families find that community village is Intensive Family Preservation (IFP).
- The Basics:
IFP supports families involved with DCF due to concerns of abuse and neglect. The program is designed to maintain children safely in the home by helping parents develop skills to manage their lives, improve their parenting and connect to needed community resources.
- Referred by:
Connecticut Department of Children and Families
- More Information:
“Our goal is to help parents put supports in place so that their family can grow together, and their children can remain in their care,” says Angeles Ramos, MS, LMFT, program manager. “Those supports could be anything from assistance with advocating for their child’s school services, or assisting parents with connecting to their own behavioral health services.”
Over four to six months, twice a week, Ramos’s team meets families in their home, or wherever it may be useful, like a library or elsewhere in the community. Teams partner heavily with DCF, even doing a monthly joint visit.
IFP teams provide skill development and assistance in developing a healthy and safe family environment, based on an individualized intervention plan to meet the unique needs of each family member. Interventions are based on key areas for change.
“What gets me coming in every day is seeing how often we’re successful,” she says. “We take great pride when we look at family satisfaction data after they are discharged. It’s overwhelmingly positive, and bear in mind this is often a situation where the services are being mandated to the family. We see the difference we make.”
In IFP and so many other Wheeler programs, staff are entering a family’s home to work, which sets it apart from other services, like outpatient behavioral health care.
“When you enter someone’s home, someone’s environment, you’re getting a systemic view of the family,” Ramos adds. “You’re seeing the hallways they walk down, how the children walk to school, and you’re experiencing their lives through the environment around them. There’s nothing like it. You gain a holistic view of the client and family, and you can more readily see the things that we can do to help them thrive in the community.”
IN THIS SERIES ON WHEELER'S GRANT-FUNDED PROGRAMS
- Healing at Home: MST and MDFT Programs at Wheeler Health
- Planning for a Better Tomorrow – Care Coordination
- SAFE Family Recovery
- Intensive Family Preservation
- Supportive Housing for Families
- Upcoming in this series...
- PROUD and REACH
- Community Justice
- Congregate Care
- Community Support for Families
- And much more!
