A neurobehavioral intervention incorporated into a state early intervention program is associated with higher perceived quality of care among parents of high-risk newborns.

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to compare two models of early intervention (EI) service delivery-a neurobehavioral intervention and usual care-on parents' perceived quality of EI service delivery. Families of newborns referred to EI were randomly assigned to a neurobehavioral intervention or usual care group and followed until the infant was 12 weeks corrected gestational age. The intervention group (n = 25) received a weekly neurobehavioral intervention. The usual care group (n = 13) received standard weekly home visits. Mothers completed the Home Visiting Index (HVI) measuring the quality of EI service delivery. Mixed linear regression was used to examine group differences in quality scores. The intervention group reported higher quality of care related to facilitating optimal parent-infant social interaction (mean difference = 2.17, 95% CI: 0.41, 3.92).A neurobehavioral model of service delivery can be successfully integrated into EI programming and appears to be associated with higher parent-reported perceived quality.