Service coordination in children's mental health: An empirical study from the caregiver's perspective

Service coordination from the perspective of parents and other caregivers whose children have serious emotional disabilities was examined in this study. Service coordination was assessed with a self-report instrument administered to 266 caregivers. Analyses focused on the relationship of service coordination to child and family characteristics, service system complexity, family participation, overall satisfaction with services, and comprehensiveness of needs met. Although complexity of services was not related to service coordination, the severity of children's problems was inversely related and family participation was positively related to service coordination. In addition, service coordination significantly predicted satisfaction with services and comprehensiveness. The findings illustrate the utility of including the family perspective in the assessment of systems of care. Of the many challenges facing those who serve children with emotional disabilities, the coordination of services is certainly one of the most difficult. Children with emotional disabilities frequently require a complex array of services, yet efforts to integrate services from multiple providers can be impeded by a variety of administrative, operational, and fiscal barriers. The task of coordination is especially challenging when attempts are made to truly individualize services to meet the unique needs of children rather than match children with conventional, "off the shelf " resources (Stroul & Friedman, 1986, 1988; VanDenBerg, 1993). With individualized services, the number o