1. Regional Needs Assessment Mindfulness Curriculum
Group-Based Mindfulness Program for Parents of Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder Suzannah Iadarola, Valerie Smith, & Susan Hetherington Rochester Regional Center for Autism Spectrum Disorder Strong Center for Developmental Disabilities, University of Rochester
1Abbeduto et al., Jones et al., Ferraioli & Harris, Dykens et al., Segal, Williams, & Teasdale, 2001
Background
Parents of children with ASD report particularly high levels of stress1
Common mechanisms of stress include avoidance, lack of control, distancing2
Mindfulness-based intervention (MBI) have been increasingly popular for addressing health and stress in parents of children with developmental disabilities3,4
Week
Topic
Content 1
Awareness and automatic pilot
Introduce mindfulness, mindful practice, home practice 2
Bringing awareness to thoughts
Automatic thoughts, observing thoughts, relationship among thoughts and emotions, discuss mindful interactions with children 3
Seeing thoughts as thoughts
Mental tapes, seeing thoughts as thoughts, grief and loss, addressing thoughts in the moment 4
Nonjudgmental acceptance
Acceptance, identifying judgments, attachment and aversion , leaning into suffering 5
Self-compassion and lovingkindness
Noticing links between activity and mood, identifying pleasant activities, introducing self-compassion, identifying means of self-care 6
Expanded awareness
Staying present, expanding awareness, dealing with difficulty, effectiveness, program summary; plans for continued practice
Regional Needs Assessment
Completed through the Rochester Regional Center for ASD, a state-funded resource center
Surveys sent to parents, providers, and stakeholders in 17 counties in Western New York
Family stress identified as a large concern
Successes
-100% of parents rated the program as “helpful” or “very helpful”
-Enrollment continues to grow
-Parents enjoy group format
-We were able to start providing child care last year
Barriers
-Daytime versus evening preference
-Attending every session is difficult --Funding to disseminate more broadly in the community
Next Steps
-Continue with our annual program
-Expand programs to educators working with students with ASD
-Continue to individualize program based upon participant feedback
Mindfulness Curriculum
Mindfulness:
Techniques that emphasizes awareness of thoughts, beliefs, and feelings, the objective of which is to change an individual’s relationship to and experience of distress
Curriculum
6 weekly, 2 hour groups meetings (6-13 parents)
Adapted from Mindfulness Based Cognitive Therapy for Depression5
Didactics, discussion, mindfulness practice, home practice
Aspects of format and content were driven by needs assessment
Previous Research
Shown to be feasible and efficacious in two small studies3
Associated with improvements in global health (p=.02) and perception of difficult child behavior (p=.05), compared to psychoeducation group
High satisfaction rates (4.3/5.0)
High feasibility (79% retention)
3 parents
Year 1
6 parents
Year 2
13 parents
Year 3
Supported by the NYS Education Department and the University of Rochester CTSA award number UL1 RR from the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences of the National Institutes of Health.