74 Chapter 4 Abstract To improve access to early interventions for infants and toddlers with a neurodevelopmental vulnerability, the BEAR (Blended E-health for children at eArly Risk) intervention was developed. BEAR is a brief, easily accessible, parent-adopted, and blended e-health intervention to promote parental sensitivity to their child’s needs and, through that, to motivate the child to socially engage. The effects of the intervention are currently being studied through a two-armed cluster randomized controlled trial (RCT). This study presents the results of pilot testing the BEAR intervention in a small sample (N=6). The aim of this pilot study was to assess the feasibility of the research design and address any potential research challenges. The results suggest that most parents and children show improvement across multiple levels (joint engagement, parental skills, and parental well-being) following the BEAR intervention, although some parents and children appear to experience a decline. At first impression, BEAR can be a helpful first step for parents in supporting their child’s needs with parents being actively involved during the whole process. For some children, this intervention will be the influx to more intensive and specialized healthcare, whereas for other children BEAR will function as a preventive intervention. Evidently, robust replication in a larger sample is needed.
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MjY0ODMw