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MA
School Gets 'Ok' to Use Shock Treatments for Year -
A special education school where two emotionally
disturbed students were wrongly given dozens of shocks after a prank call
will be allowed to use electric shock treatments on students for another
year.
In The Name of Treatment:
A Parent's Guide to Protecting Your Child From the Use of
Restraint, Aversive Interventions, and Seclusion (PDF) -
Includes detailed information on restraint, aversive
interventions, and seclusion. Also included is a "No Consent
Form" for parents to give to their school to deny permission to
use aversive procedures. Note: Images included are of children
being restrained. Some viewers may find these images disturbing.
Reformers Push to
End Restraint, Seclusion - Death, injuries prompt training of
workers in more positive methods. Matthew
Goodman, an autistic teen, spent the last 16 months of his life
heavily sedated, in arm splints and a helmet, at Bancroft NeuroHealth
in New Jersey. The restraints were supposed to keep him from picking
at an injury, but his mother thinks they contributed to his death at
age 14. Children who fight, throw
tantrums or threaten workers while in residential care in Ohio are
more likely to be tackled or dragged to a ‘‘seclusion room" than given
a psychiatric drug.
U.S.
Connecticut and
Michigan Will Help Develop Alternatives To Restraint
- Three years ago, the Hartford Courant ran an
investigative series into the restraint-related deaths of adults
and children -- as young as 6 years of age -- in institutions
housing people with mental illness and developmental
disabilities. The team of reporters found that 142 such deaths
occurred nationwide during the previous 10 years.
The
Family Alliance to Stop Abuse and Neglect - a New Jersey
organization currently dealing with the issues surrounding
restraint.
The Use of
Physical Restraints on Special Education Children has to End
- I made a phone call the other day to Jake's
school to state my position on restraining my son. He is hands
off! No questions! This is a comment I would have never thought
I have to make and, frankly shouldn’t have to make.
Sample Letter:
Letter Requesting "No Restraint" -
click here.
Behavioral Health
Groups Publish "Learning
From Each Other: Success Stories and Ideas for Reducing
Restraint/Seclusion in Behavioral Health" - Resource Guide
Provides Practical Help in Creating a Culture of Safety, Respect, and
Dignity.
The Child Welfare
League of America (CWLA), in collaboration with the Federation of
Families for Children's Mental Health, serves as the Coordinating
Center for a three-year project designed to
reduce
the use of restraint and seclusion procedures with children
receiving services in five demonstration sites across the country.
Matthews Law: "Restraints are the failure of treatment."
Matthew Goodman was born on March 4, 1987. As a toddler he was
diagnosed with autism. At age nine Matthew went to live at the
Haddonfield, New Jersey campus of Bancroft NeuroHealth, where his
family believed he would receive a good education and appropriate
therapy. In September of 2000 Bancroft placed Matthew in arm
restraints, later adding a helmet similar to a hockey mask. Against
the protests of his parents, Matthew was made to wear these restraints
during the day and often during the night. He no longer was taken to
school, saw no friends, enjoyed no recreation, and was offered no
activities or programming. In addition to the mechanical restraints
Matthew was drugged with medication. He spent his days lying on the
floor of Bancroft's "neurohealth unit," barely conscious. On February
6, Matthew died of pneumonia and blood poisoning after 16 months of
restraint.
Positive Behavior
Support Information from Bridges4Kids -
click here.
Alternatives to
Restraint
List from the
Matthew's Law Website
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The Rehabilitation
Research and Training Center on Positive Behavioral Support, funded by
the National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research, U.S.
Department of Education:
http://rrtcpbs.fmhi.usf.edu/
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The Beach Center on
Disability at the University of Kansas, providing technical
assistance, policy analyses, and research linking positive behavioral
supports to quality of family life:
http://www.beachcenter.org
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TASH, an international
association concerned with human dignity, civil rights, education, and
independence for all individuals with disabilities:
http://tash.org/
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Autism Research and
Training Center of the University of California at Santa Barbara,
developing positive behavioral supports for a disability considered
especially challenging:
http://www.education.uscb.edu/autism/
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The Journal of
Positive Behavioral Interventions:
http://www.education.ucsb.edu/autism/jpbi.html
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