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M. HEALTH GOALS AND UNMET HEALTH CARE NEEDS
Good health and good health care are important to all Early Head Start families. Almost all parents agreed that better health or better health care was one of their goals (96 percent agreed this was a goal in at least one follow-up interview), although few volunteered this as a goal in response to a general question about their family goals (Table 12).
| 7 Months After Enrollment |
16 Months After Enrollment |
28 Months After Enrollment |
By 28 Months After Enrollment |
|
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Percentage Who Had the Following Goals: |
||||
|
85.3 | 81.5 | 80.3 | 96.4 |
|
NA | 8.9 | 10.9 | 14.1 |
| Percentage Who Reported That Following
Resources Were Never or Seldom Adequate: |
||||
|
7.8 | 5.3 | 4.0 | 13.9 |
|
26.3 | 17.9 | 14.2 | 36.2 |
|
26.4 | 31.6 | 28.7 | NA |
|
31.2 | 16.6 | 14.9 | NA |
|
23.0 | 13.3 | 24.2 | NA |
| Sample Sizea | 144-941 | 112-926 | 131-1,051 | 1,016-1,053 |
| Source: Parent services follow-up interviews completed an average of 7, 16, and 28 months after enrollment for families who completed the 28-month follow-up interview. | ||||
| NA = not available. | ||||
| aRange reflects minimum and maximum sample sizes for items in table. | ||||
Getting help for a child with disabilities was a goal for a small proportion of families. About 9 percent of families reported getting help for a child with disabilities as a goal at the time of the second two follow-up interviews, and 13 percent reported this goal at some time during the combined follow-up period.16
Some Early Head Start parents reported that their family seldom or never received the medical care it needed. During each follow-up period, 4 to 8 percent of parents reported this to be the case, and at some time during the combined follow-up period, 14 percent of parents reported that their family seldom or never received the medical care it needed.
Dental care needs were less likely than medical care needs to be met. During each follow-up period, 15 to 24 percent of parents reported that their family seldom or never received the dental care it needed. At some time during the combined follow-up period, 35 percent of parents reported that their family seldom or never received the dental care it needed.
Among families with a child with special needs17 (such as a physical or emotional disability), approximately one-fourth reported that the assistance they received for that child was never or seldom adequate. At the time of the first follow-up interview, 24 percent reported that assistance was never or seldom adequate. This percentage fell to 17 percent in the second follow-up interview, and rose again to 26 percent at the time of the third follow-up interview. This pattern suggests that disabilities identified early were addressed and that unmet needs decreased in the second follow-up period, but as new disabilities emerged as children got older, services may not have been available or families may have left Early Head Start and were not able to access services for their child’s special needs on their own.
16 The question about family goals asked about getting help for a disabled child and did not define "disabled" in relation to eligibility for early intervention services. (back)
17 Parents were asked whether their child had special needs, such as a physical or emotional disability. (back)
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