The Adaire Programme

This chapter describes a service delivery programme overseen by the author that provided clinician-led therapy and support for parents with a severe mental illness. Therapy had a dual focus, of helping parents to manage their mental illness, and of improving their parenting skills. The intervention provided seven components: assessment of parenting capacity using a structured instrument; a self-management approach to manage the mental illness; in-home parenting coaching; psycho-education for children; reparation therapy; re-attribution therapy; and linking and coordination with community services.