Vitor Franco

Problemas do desenvolvimento infantil e intervenção precoce

A Intervencao Precoce (IP) e hoje uma pratica multidisciplinar que procura responder as necessidades de criancas com perturbacoes do desenvolvimento e em situacoes de risco, ultrapassando os antigos modelos de estimulacao precoce. O problema de decidir quais as criancas e familias que devem ser apoiadas e as exigencias do planejamento das intervencoes acentuam a importância de um procedimento claro de caraterizacao, ou de diagnostico, tanto das criancas como das situacoes. No modelo em que assenta a rede de intervencao precoce, de base local, implementada numa ampla regiao de Portugal, sao enfatizadas as dimensoes relacionais e contextuais do desenvolvimento e do risco. Dentro desta perspetiva, os autores tem procurado desenvolver praticas e instrumentos que permitam uma melhor elegibilidade dos casos e uma orientacao tecnica de intervencao mais focada nas efetivas necessidades da crianca, da familia e do contexto. Sao aqui apresentados os resultados da utilizacao da ODIP – Organizacao Diagnostica em Intervencao Precoce – na caracterizacao das problematicas de desenvolvimento e de risco de um total de 1.169 criancas e respetivos contextos.

Medical ontology for treatment of clinical data from children and youth

The use of information technologies in the field of biomedical data management has grown considerably and is today one of the main fields of use of these technologies. There are several advantages arising either to an individuals health or to public health, particularly because access to clinical data become available anywhere access via the Internet or individual health card. This card will contain personal data accessible from a terminal card reader, identical to the citizen card. This work focuses on the development of an ontology of universal data structure so that the information is accessible and organized in the same way, regardless of the system that use them. In this context there is the need to incorporate security mechanisms, the respect of ethical principles underlying the management and maintenance of clinical data, ensuring maximum confidentiality. To develop the proposed ontology, for the treatment of clinical data of children and youth is used as reference bulletin health in Portugal. Using this structure, it follows the clear and unambiguous identification of the fields required for registration of clinical information, standardized in a relational model. To ensure the confidentiality of data, identification of the individual is only the number of national health system and are not recorded on the card personal data such as name, address or contact forms.

Autoconceito dos professores: principais factores usando modelos de Análise de Dados Multivariada

ABSTRACT The self-concept has been considered as a very important dimension on teacher’s personality, practice and development (MARKUS; WURF, 1987; SIMOES, 2001). The present research concerns a sample of 281 teachers of Natural Science of the Third Cycle of Basic Education from Portugal that responded to the I.C.A.C. – Self-Concept Clinical Inventory (VAZ-SERRA, 1986). In the analysis of the questionnaires different multivariate data analysis methods have been used. This paper describes some results issued from correspondence analysis and hierarchical clustering models based on the affinity coefficient. The results obtained: 1) confirm the importance of two general main factors / types which are present in self-concept: social acceptance and self-efficiency; 2) characterise these main factors when teachers’ clinical self-concept is concerned and 3) show how determinant these factors are for the building of self-concept that allow us to differentiate teachers. Keywords: self-concept; teachers; self-efficiency; social acceptance.

A National Early Intervention System as a Strategy to Promote Inclusion and Academic Achievement in Portugal

Early intervention with children at risk or facing developmental problems is a practice defined by three fundamental characteristics: being family-centered, being based on the community and on the child’s life context, and being conducted by a team with transdisciplinary practice. In this paper we wish to present how the SNIPI-National System of Early Intervention, implemented in Portugal over the past 15 years, contributes to promote maximum development and the full inclusion of children up to 6 years of age and works to prevent school failure. The SNIPI covers the entire territory and intends to respond to the needs of children with developmental disorders or those in at risk situations. This community-based early intervention model is linked to the health, education and social care systems, involving the three responsible Ministries. In the present community case study, we present the implementation of this program in the Alentejo region, involving 31 local teams and almost 2500 children. Through the regional structure’s reports and the responses of parents and professionals in impact studies, we demonstrate how the system is established and how it tackles school failure and improves the educational inclusion of these children. The impact of this Early Intervention model has been significant not only on children’s developmental outcomes, but also for the health, education and social care professionals who work in a transdisciplinary perspective, as well as for the families who became more skilled at evaluating the children’s needs and the support provided. This approach to implementing a family-centered Early Intervention program can contribute to full inclusion. It facilitates the transition to schooling based on a non-discriminatory approach and educational achievement by aiding development and an adapted contextualization in pre-school education. This program system introduces significant innovation within the framework of existing educational policies that promote development and inclusion, and has therefore earned the interest of the scientific community and policy-makers alike. It has been possible to implement some of principles already studied but it had never been tested. The Early Intervention program in Alentejo, as part of the SNIPI, can be an example of good practices, with its own characteristics that allowed to create a network of integrated and comprehensive responses to the needs of the population in this region.

Tornar-se pai/mãe de uma criança com transtornos graves do desenvolvimento

O interesse pela pesquisa sobre os pais das criancas com transtornos graves do desenvolvimento tem conhecido diferentes focos de interesse ao longo do tempo, desde uma abordagem mais psicopatologica, interessada em descrever os aspectos negativos gerados pelo impacto de ter um filho com deficiencia, passando pelo estudo das estrategias de coping usadas para lidar com a situacao, ate ao conhecimento das forcas e da resiliencia que esses pais mobilizam nas suas vivencias. A grande mudanca, no entanto, deriva de os pais/maes serem considerados nao apenas em funcao da crianca, mas tambem pelo que acontece no seu proprio processo de desenvolvimento. Esta perspectiva desenvolvimental e aqui abordada a partir da construcao dos vinculos fundamentais presentes na ligacao entre mae/pai e o seu bebe, o modo como tal ligacao e quebrada e como pode ser reconstruida quando a crianca apresenta um diagnostico de transtorno grave. So a retoma do seu proprio processo de desenvolvimento, por parte dos pais, lhes permitira exercer plenamente a sua parentalidade de forma emocionalmente adequada e consistente, assente numa responsividade permanente perante as circunstâncias da vida quotidiana. Esta perspectiva permite abrir novos desafios interdisciplinares quanto a forma de trabalhar na intervencao precoce no desenvolvimento infantil e a uma leitura abrangente do trabalho centrado na familia.

Cross-cultural adaptation and validation of the Portuguese version of the "European Health and Behaviour Survey-section B".

BACKGROUND The European Health and Behaviour Survey is a questionaire used to assess a wide range of health-related behaviours, attitudes to health, beliefs concerning the importance of behaviours for health, and health knowledge, using a standardized protocol suitable for translation and administration in different countries of Europe. The objective of this study was to translate and culturally adapt the EHBS-Section B (section used to assess attitudes towards the importance of 25 activities for health) to the Portuguese language and to test its reliability and validity. METHODS This new version was obtained with forward/backward translations, consensus panels and a pre-test. The Portuguese versions of EHBS-Section B, Health and Risk-taking Behaviour Scale (HRBS), Health Belief Scale (HBS) and a form for the characteristics of the participants were applied to 849 Portuguese adolescents. RESULTS Reliability was good with a Cronbachs alpha coefficient of 0.867, and an intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) of 0.96. Corrected item-total coefficients ranged from 0.301 to 0.620 and weighted kappa coefficients ranged from 0.74 to 0.94 for the 17 items of the EHBS-Section B. Construct validity was supported by the confirmation of two predefined hypotheses involving expected significant correlations between EHBS-Section B, HRBS and HBS that represent similar constructs. CONCLUSIONS The Portuguese EHBS-Section B exhibited suitable psychometric properties, in terms of internal consistency, reproducibility and construct validity. It can be used in educational and research settings.

P02-18 Risk behaviours in adolescence: Prediction cognitive and psychosocial

This investigations main goal was to determine if some psychosocial (self-concept, control locus, assertiveness and satisfaction towards social support) and cognitive variables (health beliefs and attitudes towards health) were associated to health related behaviours. The sample was constituted by 829 teenagers, 382 male and 447 female, whose average age is 14.66 years old, who attended the 9th grade of the public and daily schools in the district of Viseu, Portugal. Results 1. Study on the association between health and risk behaviours and psychosocial variables: The better the self-concept, the better the behaviours; The higher the satisfaction with social support, the better the behaviours; The higher the assertiveness, the better the behaviours; The association between control locus and healthy and risk behaviours is not significant. 2. Study on the association between health and risk behaviours and cognitive variables: The more favourable the attitudes towards health, the better the behaviours; The more adequate the health beliefs, the better the behaviours. 3. Study on the psychosocial variables interaction effects with cognitive variables in health and risk behaviour prediction: The interaction variable was revealed as the best health and risk behaviour predictor is the variable resulting from Factor 1 - behavioural aspect (Self-Concept) and Factor 4 - preventive attitude (Attitudes Towards Health) interaction, with a determination coefficient (R2) of .409. The patterned coefficient analysis Beta (beta=.427) indicates that the higher this interaction effect (F1 - behavioural aspect * F4 - preventive attitude) the better the behaviours.