24-Apr-2015
Sudha Nambudiri
KOCHI: Frustrated, harassed and helpless parents of children diagnosed with specific disabilities needing therapeutic intervention have formed a group called 'Together We Can' in Kochi.
The group aims to ensure safe and healthy therapy practices in centres dealing with children who cannot speak or react.
What triggered the formation of the group were incidents such as a child's arm being broken during an occupational therapy session and parents being denied access to therapy sessions, etc.
Most parents do not complaint out of fear that their children may be denied therapy sessions. "In most therapy centres, parents sit outside tensed, wondering whether their child is crying or learning something. We spend most of our time with the child and a session is about 45 minutes. So ideally, we should be taught what to do when the child gets hyper, when he is not listening, etc. We need to train him. But since we are sitting outside, we do not know what to do," says a parent of a five-year-old who is undergoing therapy.
But therapists feel that children do not respond well in the presence of parent. "But why not have a glass enclosure so that we can watch what is being taught. After all, we have to be trained to handle the child," says another parent of a seven-year-old.
Padma Pillai, who has a 10-year-old son taking therapy sessions, says that there is no transparency in the system. "Half of the professionals are not trained psychologists, therapists. In some centres, they are good. But with so many children, we get only two sessions a week for the child. As parents, we should understand how to handle the child." She says that her child had a traumatic experience in a therapy centre and it took almost a year for him to get over the experience. "Now, I have left my career to devote to all his needs. But in Kochi, there is hardly any centre where the therapist allow parents to watch the session," she says.
Autistic and other special children are poor communicators. So, they cannot communicate what is being taught and trained.
Psychologist and special educator Seema Lal, who trains parents, says the methodology followed by many centres is not correct. "Ideally, if a child is sitting in a session, parents should also watch what's happening as they have to learn. Autistic children have varying degrees of disability. The child may not respond well at a therapy session. But if he has to learn, he has to be trained continuously at home. For that, the parents have to be trained," she says.
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