Changing patterns of social services to mentally handicapped (MH) children require that parents assume new roles in addition to that of consumer of services. (GW)

Results of a questionnaire completed by 100 social service agencies indicated that the agencies held positive attitudes toward adoption placements for mentally retarded children. (CL)

An individual with a disability complains that under the blanket term "disabled" individual needs and rights are not respected, privacy is invaded, people are always being evaluated but never asked to evaluate services they receive, and everything must be part of a "program" rather than just part of daily life. (JDD)

This paper, developed by a group of parents, advocates, and service providers, addresses the limitations of human services for people with developmental disabilities, including: (1) services cannot "fix" people or problems; (2) consistency and uniformity are not necessarily good qualities of human services; (3) more human services are not…

The editorial describes a proposed interagency university-based social/health maintenance model to provide health and medical services to developmentally disabled persons in the Buffalo, New York, area. (DB)

Referral advice was requested for mildly mentally retarded infants, profoundly mentally retarded infants, or Down's syndrome infants. Years of practice and population of town where the practice was located were the two variables that showed statistically significant relationships to physicians' advice. (Author)

The potential partnership and advantages of links between public and private agencies is stressed as a means whereby services to clients difficult to reach can be delivered. (Author)

The agencies requiring the longest amount of time to respond generally provided better quality responses. The size of the agency seemed unrelated to either the speed or the quality of response. Response quality was generally inadequate with less than 50 percent of the responding states adequately answering the parent's question. (Author)

The president of the American Association on Mental Retardation examines progress in four areas of mental retardation, for individuals with mental retardation, the nation, the Association, and all individuals. The four areas are choice, advocacy, supports, and equity. (DB)

Makes recommendations for providing better services to people with developmental disabilities, including clarifying the support that people with developmental disabilities need and providing that support; making a fundamental shift toward community based programs; eliminating rigid and complex rules; creating the future; and making a commitment to…

This article suggests that the current philosophy of treating everyone the same (i.e., community placement at any cost for all individuals with mental retardation) is leading to taxpayer revolts and does not necessarily produce effective services for the individuals involved. Residential facilities can provide individualized services for some…

Meeting the challenge of providing supported living for people with developmental disabilities calls for new relationships among people receiving support, those providing support, and families. The focus should be on assisting people with developmental disabilities to establish a sense of place, security of place, and effective personalized…

Families (n=223) enrolled in Michigan's Cash Subsidy Program for families of children with developmental disabilities were surveyed about their resources, use of services, and helpfulness of social supports. Parents saw their basic resources for daily life as adequate but viewed their time, discretionary money, and child care resources as…