The Global Orphan Project together with Kings Kids Africa have centered a programme to train the children’s care takers designed to be delivered as part of a network of health and social services for children and families. The programme structure and content have been designed to be adapted and it has the flexibility to incorporate the characteristics of local health and educational systems and in different cultural settings.
The engagement of families and communities was considered paramount to make caregivers’ attendance and participation in the programme feasible. It was proposed that the programme should be organised in a modular way, with ‘core’ individual and group sessions followed by additional optional sessions, according to specific needs and availability of resources. The Kings Kids Africa programme addresses the challenge of the heterogeneous needs of children and families first by defining individualised intervention targets, taking into account the child’s developmental level and the family’s priorities. Secondly, one-to-one tailored coaching is provided to the caregivers during group sessions and home visits. Lastly, optional modules and add-ons to the core sessions are available to ensure that additional medical conditions and other co-occurring needs are addressed. Considering the complex nature of such tasks, continuous support and supervision were included to effectively support the implementation of CST by non-specialist providers.
