Early intervention

This study was designed to examine the most common characteristics, best practices, and gaps in service delivery at Early Intervention (EI) centres across Canada. A 29-item survey designed to investigate services, funding, waitlists, satisfaction, and perceptions of success was completed by 184 service providers. Provinces and territories were grouped according to time zone and five resulting samples were compared. Samples were comparable in terms of waitlists, perception of success and government contributions. Significant differences were found in terms of the number of professionals working at the centre, with the Mountain and Eastern samples having the most multidisciplinary centres. In addition to making cross-province comparisons, Canadian findings were also explored. As the proportion of government funding decreased and private funding increased, ratings of satisfaction significantly increased. Findings were discussed in relation to the relevance to Canadian EI centres and directions for future research were explored