Context
This project addresses an urgent need to enhance the quality of prevention and early intervention policy and practice for children and young people by focusing on the experiences of disabled parents and the professionals who support them. The nexus of parenting and disability has tended to be parenting children with disabilities. Indeed, 鈥渋t has barely been taken account that a visually impaired child might one day become a parent鈥 (Van Havermaet et al., 2021). While it is clearly important and necessary to support disabled and non-disabled parents to parent their disabled child, there is also a separate and equally important need to focus on equitable support for disabled parents and their children. Parenthood is described as the final frontier for disability rights (Kirshbaum & Olkin, 2002).
In Ireland, parenting services and disability services have developed separately, with little dialogue, and no dedicated supports for disabled parents.
Parenthood is an arena in which disabled people encounter prejudice, stigma, and systemic bias (Franklin et al., 2022; Lightfoot et al., 2017; Molden, 2014). The experiences of Irish disabled parents, mirror those of their international counterparts, in that they experience ableist, negative and at times coercive attitudes from health and social care professionals (Flynn et al., 2023; Walsh-Gallagher et al., 2012; Lawler et al., 2015). Internationally 鈥 and in Ireland - disabled parents are disproportionately represented in care proceedings (Corbet & Coulter, 2024; Lightfoot & DeZelar, 2016), despite evidence that disabled parents can provide satisfactory care when appropriately supported (Spencer et al., 2024).
For their part, professionals acknowledged their lack of 鈥榗ompetence, knowledge and skill鈥 (Walsh-Gallagher et al., 2013). There is a need to improve professionals鈥 understanding of disability and parenting with disability and enhance services for disabled parents (Albert & Powell, 2020). And indeed, professionals appear to be interested in such training (Edwards et al., 2022).
To address this need, this project will establish a professional Community of Practice to support professionals in health, social care, and child protection services, to improve their understanding of disability and parenting with a disability. The project will raise awareness and share information and best practice amongst a diverse group of professionals.
This project will be cross-disability, inter-disciplinary, and cross-sectoral, and aligns with international human rights standards, enhances inclusive service delivery, and sustains quality through evidence-based, co-produced approaches. Given the gap between the aspirations of the UN CRPD and practice on the ground, the project will be underpinned by implementation science approaches. The project will maintain integrity by involving disabled parents and disabled professionals at all stages in the design, roll out, and evaluation. The project builds on a recent HRB funded conference Supporting Disabled Parents.