Each year, the TASH Conference brings together a diverse community of stakeholders who gain information, learn about resources, and connect with others across the country to strengthen the disability field. This year’s conference theme, “Be Creative - Innovative Solutions for an Inclusive Life,” reminds us to think outside the box during times of uncertainty. Creativity, innovation, and determination can pave the way for meaningful and inclusive lives for people with disabilities.
Parent to Parent support is an evidence-based intervention for parents of children with disabilities or special healthcare needs. Help-seeking parents are matched with a trained supporting parent/parent navigator who has a child very much like theirs. Parent to Parent USA's endorsed practice for a match is that the pair talk over the phone at least four times over the course of two months (Santelli, 2002) . A mixed-methods evaluation of Parent to Parent showed that parents who received at least four calls successfully addressed the problem that prompted them to call, and had the greatest improvement in their acceptance of their child's disability (Singer et al., 1999). Parent to Parent coordinators have expressed that younger parents who contact their program often state a preference for text-based support. They are more comfortable soliciting support on Facebook, Listservs, and by text and email messages (Dodds, 2015). Because these support paradigms have developed since the original evaluation research was conducted in the late 1990s, it is unclear whether text-based support is as effective as telephone support, and what best practices should be endorsed. It is critical to the sustainability of Parent to Parent organizations to begin to explore how text-based support is being utilized within programs so that we may develop research to assess its efficacy and develop evidence-based best practice guidelines for the provision of text-based Parent to Parent support.
