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protest-ro] Vali Nas (valinash), the connection of international adoption networks

protest-ro] Vali Nas (valinash), the connection of international adoption networks

Radu Iliescu Fri, 05 Jan 2007 07:39:32 -0800

Let's see how some of them worked and are still working

the intermediaries of international adoptions from Romania.

The case of Vali Nas (valinash), according to some it was also called in the past

Barbara Stamm anunta investitii sociale importantevizionat (469)

Barbara Stamm anunta investitii sociale importantevizionat (469)

Barbara Stamm si Gheorghe Nichita

Alte articole din Social

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Sri Lanka - ID mother wrong

Amber

Ik ben zelf 23 jaar geleden geadopteerd uit Srilanka. En ik zal een lang verhaal in het kort beschrijven. Na de tsunami ben ik gaan zoeken naar mijn biologische moeder. Dit aan de hand van haar naam die op mijn adoptiepapieren stond. De vrouw die mijn moeder zou zijn was gevonden. Op haar identiteitsbewijs stond dezelfde naam als op mijn papieren. Na een dna- onderzoek bleek echter dat zij mijn moeder helemaal niet was. 

Veel mensen die geadopteerd zijn en op zoek gaan, doen nooit een dna-test. Ik raad dit dus wel aan. Iedereen zei tegen mij: "Doe het niet, je ziet toch dat het je moeder is?". Ik voelde dat er iets niet klopte en heb de test toch door laten gaan. 

Waarschijnlijk zal ik nooit meer mijn biologische moeder vinden. Papieren zijn misschien omgewisseld. Als baby ben ik misschien omgewisseld. Wie zal het weten? Adoptiebureaus of de medewerkers in de desbetreffende landen daar, gaan hier heel slordig mee om. 

Focus on Adoption Implores Department of State to Implement Solutions For Children and Prevent Country Shutdown.

Focus on Adoption Implores Department of State to Implement Solutions For Children and Prevent Country Shutdown. For many years, Focus on Adoption (FOA) has been a leading force in the push for improvements to the Guatemalan adoption system that would add safeguards, while serving the mission of intercountry adoption to provide permanency in loving, stable family environments for children without parental care. In addition to suggesting viable solutions, members of the FOA Board of Directors, independently and on behalf of the organization, have attempted to forge a more vigilant approach to rooting out the ethical breaches that have unfortunately occurred in the Guatemalan system. FOA maintains that policy makers for intercountry adoption systems need to carefully consider the needs of children when considering regulatory models in order to assure that functional delivery of necessary services is not compromised by overly restrictive regulation. Hundreds of thousands of children in other Latin American countries have been deprived of the families who would embrace them because of the current emphasis on total centralization rather than implementation of functional intercountry adoption systems. In fact, the problem areas in Guatemalan adoptions about which the U.S. Department of State (DOS) is expressing concern have gone unregulated, in spite of requests by adoption professionals that DOS implement safeguards to prevent them. Adds FOA president Hannah Wallace, “Some, if not most, of the fraudulent practices DOS has recently uncovered could have been prevented if DOS and other governmental authorities had acted on reports from adoption professionals years ago and implemented the solutions proposed by adoption professionals with intimate working knowledge of Guatemala.” One of FOA’s primary concerns is that there not be a repeat in Guatemala of what has happened in other Latin American countries where implementation of completely centralized adoption systems has resulted in virtual shutdowns of intercountry adoption. DOS is pressuring Guatemala to rapidly implement a system that is compliant with the Hague treaty on intercountry adoption. Unfortunately, that pressure appears to include a call for a system that removes private actors from the picture totally. Ironically, the U.S. (which has yet to implement a Haguecompliant intercountry adoption system 14 years after it signed the treaty) is in the process of implementing a system that would retain a significant private sector component. FOA supports progressive implementation of the Hague treaty in Guatemala in a manner that is functional and retains the features of the existing system that promote the best interests of children, which would necessarily mean retention of a significant role, just as in the U.S., for private sector actors. On February 21 and 22, over 200 adoption service providers from the U.S and Guatemala gathered in Guatemala for FOA’s conference titled “Solutions.” Representatives of DOS and other governmental entities involved in intercountry adoption were invited to attend and www.focusonadoption.com Business Address 601 S. Tenth Street Philadelphia, PA 19147 Remittance Address 1920 Abrams Parkway #185 Dallas, TX 75214 Participate in discussions of workable solutions to the challenges in Guatemala. Not one representative of the U.S. federal government attended. Wallace expressed FOA’s disappointment: “Guatemalan stakeholders were there and ready to work with the U.S. government, but it’s hard to work with someone who doesn’t show up.” There are solutions available right now to stop the egregious practices DOS is rightly concerned about (coercion of birthmothers, identity fraud, switching children after DNA, and inadequate foster care and medical care). Some of the workable solutions FOA has called for, that would go a long way toward preventing fraud in Guatemalan adoption while avoiding the incalculable damage that a country-wide shutdown would cause for both children and adopting families, include: • Immediate implementation of a second DNA test on the child at the end of the adoptive process to ensure that the child the adoptive family brings home is the child they were referred at the start of the process. • Videotaped interviews when the birth mother relinquishes and requirement of a psychological or social work report to ensure that the birth mother’s consent is freely given after appropriate counseling on the import of her decision. • Implementation as soon as adequate funding is raised of an iris scan process to ensure that no child switching occurs during the process. • Implementation of a requirement that monthly medical reports and pictures of the child are provided to the adoptive family during the process and to the Embassy with the final papers. • Immediate addition of adequate staff, both in Guatemala and the U.S., to enable DOS and other governmental actors to timely perform their critical functions. To be clear, FOA supports DOS’ recent efforts to identify and punish those bad actors who have engaged in fraudulent practices and harmed children. “If delays to investigate cases where concerns are raised are necessary, then we need to support DOS in performing these investigations,” says Wallace. “But the best interests of children must also be considered, and unnecessary delays in placement of children with permanent families is not in their best interest.” FOA asks DOS and other involved governmental agencies to implement the above five solutions for the children of Guatemala now to prevent the greater tragedy of a future country closure. Adoption professionals and adoptive parents are willing to implement and fund these solutions immediately. About Focus on Adoption (www.focusonadoption.com) Focus on Adoption is a non-profit intercountry adoption advocacy organization. The FOA Board of Directors consists of adoption service providers and adoptive parents. FOA President Hannah Wallace was a 2003 recipient of the prestigious Congressional Angel in Adoption Award.

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De-institutionalising and Transforming Children’s Services: A Guide to Good Practice

Effects of Institutional Care

De-institutionalising and Transforming Children’s Services: A Guide to Good Practice

View documentAuthor: Georgette Mulheir & Kevin Browne 
Date: 2007 
File Size: 771 KB

 

This document begins with the paradigm that residential care is harmful to children and that community-based care is most beneficial to children.  However, the movement from institutions to community-based care is challenging and complex.

 The article has 11 chapters:

  1. Raising awareness on deinstitutionalization:  Provides research evidence on the negative effects of residential care
  2. Managing the process of deinstitutionalization:  Provides a framework for developing a strategic plan for deinstitutionalization
  3. Analysis at regional/country level:  Outline for conducting country/region analysis
  4. Analysis at institutional level:  Outline for conducting institutional analysis
  5. Design of alternative services:  Describes the necessary services for deinstitutionalization, including prevention, substitute care, community services
  6. Planning transfer of resources:  An aid for projecting the costs of services
  7. Preparing and moving children:  Highlights the trauma children experience when moved and how to support and monitor the children
  8. Preparing and moving staff:  Addresses possible resistance of workers and assessing them for suitability in the new services
  9. Logistics:  Planning for a timescale, preparation, movement, training and opening of new services
  10. Monitoring and evaluation:  Outlines state and local responsibilities in deinstitutionalization
  11. Conclusions and recommendation:  Broader perspective and summary of the model
The document also uses various case examples and visuals such as tables and figures to help illustrate the process.

 

The document also uses various case examples and visuals such as tables and figures to help illustrate the process. 

Aibi Social Report 2007

On file - ACT

T

Swiss adoptions from Russia

 
Outils de la discussion
 
Vieux 04/07/2007, 23h07
Registered User
 
Date d'inscription: juillet 2007
Messages: 5
Adoption en Russie

Bonjour, nous sommes un couple europeean qui habite en suisse (Vaud). 
Nous allons commencer tres bientot la procédure d'adoption.
Nous souhaitons adopter un enfant (0-18mois). Nous savons que c'est difficile mais c'est possible en russie. Nous avons deja trouve un intermediare en russie mais si vous avez des renseignements sur la russie, merci de nous aider. Par exemple il a aura beaucoup des papiers de completer et les apostille etc - si vous avez informations de ca aussi .... merci ....parce que c,est tres difficile pour nous avec mon mal Francais de comprendre tous les papier et les tampons qui sont obligatoire!
Sally 
 
Vieux 20/07/2007, 07h08
Registered User
 
Date d'inscription: septembre 2005
Messages: 6
Bonjour Sally

Nous avons depuis 2 ans commencé les démarches pour adopter en russie et je peux que vous confirmer qu'il faut effectivement énormément de temps, de patience et remplir beaucoup de papier, car la russie demande beaucoup de chose. Nos démarches arrivent maintenant à la fin et si tout va bien, notre enfant devrait arriver dans le courant du mois de septembre. 

Je ne peux vous souhaiter que du courage, mais aussi beaucoup de patience. 

Salutations.

Diabolo
 
Vieux 20/07/2007, 13h17
Registered User
 
Date d'inscription: juillet 2007
Messages: 5
Adoption en Russie

Merci Diabolo
Si vous pouvez parler Anglais, dites-moi parce que c'est plus facile pour moi - merci  Oui j'ai entendu dire que c'est un ou deux ans pour tous les processes pour russie et que pour les garçons c'est plus vite - je ne sais pas pourquoi. Quelle intermediare/agence avez-vous utilisé parceque je pensais que il n'existe pas en Suisse? J'ai trouvé quelqu'un qui mon chef a utilisé (accredité et en moscow) ... elle a maintenant une petite fille et je pense la process ètait environ 2 ans aussi. Est ce que c'est le process en Suisse (Lausanne) qui prends la pluspart du temps? Nous avons envoyé notre premier papier (biographes etc) may 2007 et nous attendons......
Sally 
 
Vieux 06/08/2007, 15h11
Registered User
 
Date d'inscription: août 2007
Messages: 21
Adoption Russie

Bonjour !!! nous sommes également intéressés pour l'adoption d'un nourisson en Russie, ça serait vraiment sympa de nous dire le nom d'un intervenant en suisse (romande ou allemande) car nous croyions aussi qu'il n'y avait pas d'intermédiaire en suisse....merci beaucoup !!
 
Vieux 07/08/2007, 09h57
Registered User
 
Date d'inscription: juillet 2007
Messages: 5
Adoption en Russie

Notre intermediare qui nous esperon d'utiliser est:

Oleg Oleynikov

ecs@online.ru 

Si vous envoyez un email a lui et expliquer que je vous donne son details. Mon chef l'a deja utilisé et il est très bon mais cher......

bon chance! 
 
Vieux 08/08/2007, 16h29
Registered User
 
Date d'inscription: août 2007
Messages: 21
intermédaire Russie

Merci beaucoup Sally super !!
 
Vieux 06/02/2008, 20h15
giu giu est déconnecté
Registered User
 
Date d'inscription: février 2008
Messages: 2
Bonjour,

Nous voilà nouveaux sur ce site.

Mon mari et moi avons envoyé notre demande d'adoption à Genève en octobre 2007 et nous souhaitons adopter dans les pays de l'est. Nous ne savons pas encore exactement dans quel pays mais nous envisageons la Russie.

Nous avons appris qu'il y a un intermédiaire agréé par la Confédération pour la Russie et l'Ukraine.

Quelqu'un a -t-il réussi à adopter dans ces pays?

Un grand merci pour vos réposnes.

Nicole et Philippe
 
Vieux 06/02/2008, 20h52
Registered User
 
Date d'inscription: septembre 2005
Messages: 6
Bonjour Giu

Depuis septembre 2007 nous sommes parents d'un garcon que nous avonsadopter en Russie. L'intermédiare en suisse pour la russie est le suivant : zentrumrusslan. Vous pouvez également le trouver dans la liste de tous les intermédiares sur le site de www.admin.ch. Petite précision il sont à ZH et parle l'allemand. Si vous voulez plus de rsgt vous pouvez évt me contacter. 

Diabolo

The long road home

The long road home
Abandoned in a Romanian orphanage, Florin now lives with his adoptive mother, Clara.
While helping place Romanian orphans in foster homes, American researchers are learning valuable lessons about what impact deprivation has on the brain—and whether its effects can be reversed.
Florin lives with his adoptive family in a Bucharest apartment building where trellised grape vines arch the front path and white lace curtains filter the morning sun. A portfolio of his drawings sits by his bed; the aroma of fresh coffee fills the hall.
Lazing in PJs, this dark-haired, almond-eyed 6-year-old rests a cheek on his mother's shoulder as he watches cartoons. He wants to create them one day. "I will make my drawings more beautiful and more beautiful," he says, "and the best ones will be shown on TV." He is confident his teacher will find the best station to broadcast his pictures.
The ordinariness of Florin's life couldn't have been imagined based on where he started. Abandoned at birth in a maternity ward, he spent his first 11 months in one of Romania's infamous orphanages. Babies weren't held when crying, fed when hungry or changed when wet. Rarely did someone hum a lullaby to quiet the infants to sleep or delight them with peek-a-boo. They were left lying on their backs in cribs for hours, staring up at bare white ceilings.
Photographer Michael Carroll first visited Romania in the days after Communist dictator Nicolae Ceausescu was overthrown in 1989. His intention was to chronicle the country's AIDS crisis, but he became so consumed with the plight of the country's orphans that he founded the Romanian Children's Relief Foundation. "It was impossible to see the conditions these children were living in and not do something about it," he says. In the 18 years since that visit, Carroll has been back to Romania dozens of times, taking photos of not just the orphans and the aftermath of the Communist regime, but also the country's beautiful countryside and striking people.
Audio Slide Show
This slide show, which is narrated by Carroll and features photos he took during his many visits to Romania, offers a description of the country and the story of Romania's orphans.
Many media outlets have produced other kinds of stories about the Bucharest Early Intervention Project and the doctors helping the Romanian orphans. Below are a few of them:
The Boston Globe, November 11, 2006
NPR's "All Things Considered" September 16, 2006
The Guardian (London) February 18, 2006
Older children fared no better. They were fed and clothed, their medical needs addressed, but they sat alone while caregivers watched TV. They ate from bowls with their hands. They slept two to a short, narrow bed, many sitting up. Boys and girls wore the same clothes, the same haircuts, the same sorrowful eyes. These were children who had rarely seen a crayon, let alone drawn cartoons.
Florin could well have been one of them. But in 2001, he became part of the Bucharest Early Intervention Project (BEIP)—the first randomized study in the world to investigate whether foster care could heal the emotional and behavioral wounds of severe early childhood deprivation. Funded by the MacArthur Foundation'sResearch Network on Early Experience and Brain Development, BEIP has not only delivered Florin to normalcy, it has fueled a massive overhaul of Romanian child protective services. Its findings back with hard, cold numbers the common-sense observation that children fail when deprived of normal emotional and social interaction: dismal IQ scores, high percentages of mental illness and abnormally low heights and weights.
More importantly, BEIP's initial findings suggest that consistent, high-quality foster care, begun early enough, may reverse many of these losses and salvage young lives. These hopeful findings have implications for the services developed not just for children abandoned in Romania, but for the millions orphaned by AIDS in Africa, displaced by war in Afghanistan or shunted from one inadequate foster home to another in the United States. They may deepen our understanding of normal development, too, shedding light on "sensitive periods" during which language, emotional attachment and other vital capacities must form or be lost forever.
Heartrending opportunity 
BEIP brought three prominent American researchers to Bucharest: Charles Nelson, PhD, director of research for Children's Hospital Boston's Developmental Medicine Center; Charles Zeanah, MD, chief of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry at Tulane University; and Nathan Fox, PhD, professor of Human Development at the University of Maryland. Zeanah is an expert on emotional attachment, Nelson and Fox on how early experience molds the developing brain.
"For the brain to wire correctly, it needs input," explains Nelson, a psychologist and neuroscientist. "Children living in institutions lack stimulation on a grand scale, so we expect them to experience a range of problems due to 'errors' in brain development."
When the researchers first visited Romania in the late 1990s, they saw teenagers the size of 8-year-olds, not because of poor nutrition, but because emotional and social deprivation inhibit growth. They witnessed rows of toddlers who, lying alone for hours, waved hands repetitively in front of their faces in an effort at self-stimulation. Language and attachment, learning and attention, emotion, behavior, IQ—all can be damaged when infants are denied the coos, smiles, and consistent, one-on-one care of a normal childhood.
Such problems had been reported in the literature, but when the BEIP began, research was sparse and no study had rigorously investigated one of the most critical questions: Could foster care provide an effective antidote to early deprivation? Could institutionalized children placed with families catch up verbally? Cognitively? Emotionally? Could they thrive? Romania is providing a heartbreaking but rich environment to find answers.
Tragic legacy
In the 1960s, Romania's Communist dictator Nicolae Ceausescu decreed that the nation would be self-sufficient. Romania was to make its own bread, shoes, steel, missiles—nothing would be imported. But the state needed workers. Ceausescu mandated that all families have five children. He banned birth control and abortion and forced women to undergo gynecological exams at work to assess their fertility. He financially rewarded families for having two or more children and taxed them for every child shy of five. When families began having children they could not afford, Ceausescu built child placement centers.
By 1989, when Ceausescu's government fell, more than 100,000 Romanian children were living in state-run institutions. As images of the children's stunted bodies, blank eyes and disturbed behavior began flooding the media, Romanians were as stunned and appalled as the rest of the world. The post-Communist government began improving conditions in the placement centers.
Saving the children 
By the time Nelson and his colleagues arrived a decade later, the government had begun reuniting children with their birth families, cutting Romania's institutionalized population in half. But the country had only the beginnings of a foster-care system and no tradition of adoption. Indeed, anyone who took in another person's child was assumed to have only the darkest intentions. But a passionately committed Minister of Child Protection, Cristian Tabacaru, understood the value of family-based care and was determined to move children out of institutions and into the community. When the American researchers outlined their ideas for the BEIP, he recognized that their study could provide scientific data to convince local officials and professionals of the value of family-based care. Tabacaru offered enthusiastic support, including space for offices and a lab.
The researchers decided to follow three groups of children: those institutionalized, those moved from an institution to foster care and a control group of children who had always lived at home. The idea was to evaluate them on every conceivable developmental dimension: brain activity; emotional, intellectual, behavioral and language development; attachment to caregivers; and mental health.
But could they succeed? The team would be running this complex, multi-year project from 4,000 miles away. They needed a project coordinator, preferably bicultural, who could manage the local research staff. They needed to train that staff: Most psychologists and social workers in Romania have only undergraduate degrees and no research training. The American researchers also needed to negotiate the legal, cultural and ethical issues of studying the abandoned children, and establish a foster care network. They didn't even know if the children would cooperate or if the electrical power would be sufficient to run their equipment.
Nelson, Fox and Zeanah had visited the placement centers, however, and had seen children lying in their cots—often crying—unattended for hours. They had witnessed the consequences. As scientists, they recognized a unique opportunity to study a phenomenon that had received little attention. As men, as fathers, they were drawn to help. "I kept thinking, things happened to these children that were entirely preventable," says Nelson. "It was a conscious decision to rear them like that."
"It was impossible to go into those orphanages and not have rescue fantasies," adds Fox. "The first time there I saw a little girl with black curly hair. The parents who had abandoned her were visiting, then they just left her, abandoning her again. I wanted to put her in my suitcase and get her out of there."
A program launched
Thanks to the cooperation of the Romanian government and the child welfare agency SERA Romania, plus the political and organizational savvy of BEIP's first director, Sebastian Koga, MD, the project completed a successful pilot study in 2000 and began work in earnest in 2001. The researchers had identified 69 qualified foster families, so were able to enroll 136 institutionalized children in the study. Another 68 children from the community served as controls. All were between 5 and 30 months old.
The institutionalized children were randomly assigned to either remain in the placement center or to enter foster care. Florin was one of the lucky ones placed in foster care. His foster mother remembers when he first arrived. At 11 months, he could not sit up. He didn't smile. This little boy who now avidly describes each detail of his paintings did not babble as an 11-month-old baby should. "He would only say 'na, na, na' when I changed his diaper," recalls his mother. "He didn't like being touched."
Yet Florin was in better shape than many. Nelson and his colleagues assessed all the children before any were placed in foster care. Compared to typically developing children in the community, those in the orphanage had dramatically lower IQs (an average of 65 compared to 103) and substantially higher rates of mental illness (43 percent versus 14 percent). They smiled less, laughed less and were less likely to initiate or respond to social interaction. Their language skills were blunted, as was their ability to form healthy relationships with caregivers. Their brains reflected this paucity of development, showing significant reductions in electrical activity.
The consequences of living in the emotionally sterile institutional environment were not surprising. But the findings gave urgency to the researchers' most important question: Could foster care reverse the damage? The answer has been emerging over the past five years.
Signs of success
The BEIP provided what Nelson dubs "super-duper foster care." The project gave each family a stipend and paid for diapers and toys. A pediatrician was on call 24/7, and a social worker was sent to each home every seven to 10 days. Weekly videoconferences with the researchers back in the States let the Romanian team troubleshoot problems beyond their expertise.
Children's researcher Charles Nelson, PhD, and colleagues first went to Bucharest, Romania, in the late 1990s. Their goal was to see what effect extreme social, emotional and physical deprivation had on the country's orphans.
When the children turned 9 months old, then 18, 30, 42 and 54 months, the researchers repeated the initial assessments. They are still analyzing data (and planning a follow-up study when the children turn 7 to 8 years old), but the results so far are encouraging. The foster-care children show huge gains in intelligence, with jumps as great as 10 to 12 IQ points. They've also shown improvements in language development; the ability to form healthy relationships, even if they were withdrawn in the institutions; and improved mental health, with rates of anxiety and depression having plummeted.
Researchers have also found that the age at which a child went into foster care matters: Those placed before age 2 are talking nearly as well as their community peers; those placed later are barely improving. Similarly, IQ, weight and height gains are greatest for children placed at younger ages.
Some problems remain stubbornly unchanged regardless of the child's age at placement, however. To children with a disorder called indiscriminate friendliness, for example, all adults are interchangeable. "I remember one little boy who acted like I was his father even though he'd never seen me before," recalls Nelson. "I was there, so he grabbed my hand. He needed an adult to take him somewhere." Children like this boy are not forging the trusting relationships with specific caregivers that form the basis for intimacy throughout life.
And while many children with depression and anxiety get better, those with behavioral disorders such as attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) don't seem to be improving. This could be because the developmental window for shaping attention and behavioral control slams shut very early, before the children entered foster care, explains Nelson. But it could also be that behavioral disorders simply take longer to resolve.
The researchers are planning a new follow-up study to explore this question, among others. "Everything could change dramatically when we see the kids at 8 years," says Nelson. "Our intervention may have had a huge effect at first, but over time, the children could regress. It's equally possible, though, that they're holding their own or continuing to improve. We need to find out."
A lasting impact
For Florin, the gains have been enormous—and they've included a permanent family. His foster parents adopted him in 2004. "We loved him from the very first day," says his mother.
Florin is one of 10 BEIP children who have been adopted so far. But for every Florin, another 3,000 Romanian children remain in institutions. The bleak orphanages in which teenagers the size of 8-year-olds once languished in row after row of metal-barred cribs are long gone, but the institutions that remain can still elicit rescue fantasies. A dorm in which 5- and 6-year-olds sleep is a sea of wooden bunk beds, each with a thin mattress blanketed in blue or red. No teddy bears or books, no Winnie-the-Pooh pillowcases or finger paintings proudly taped to bedposts adorn these beds. The anonymity is bearable. The gagging odor of urine and sweat is not.
The government is working vigorously to provide alternatives for these children. It continues to reunite biological families and has built a network of foster homes and small group residences. Spurred by BEIP findings, it has banned institutionalization for children younger than 2, unless they are profoundly handicapped.
The government has also initiated programs to identify and support mothers at risk of abandoning their kids. But poverty, illiteracy, homelessness and the habits of the past have left the rate of child abandonment unchanged. According to a 2005 United Nations report, 9,000 Romanian children are left in hospitals and maternity wards each year.
Thirty years of Communist rule gutted the country's capacity to cope with this problem. A staggering amount of money, research and education are needed to develop appropriate residential, educational and medical services for formerly institutionalized children and to train staff to provide them. This is where BEIP researchers hope to have their most lasting impact. They and their Romanian partners are transforming the lab and staff developed for the BEIP into the core of a permanent Romanian Institute for Child Development (ICD).
The ICD is modeled after the renowned Developmental Medicine Center (DMC) at Children's, and will import the DMC's model of integrated and collaborative clinical services, research and training. "We want to create a landmark institution that can train Romanian child development specialists, do the research and develop the services that will give these kids the best possible chance," says Nelson.
But more than that, the BEIP researchers and their Romanian colleagues want to see that the tragedy of Romania's institutionalized children is not repeated —not there, not anywhere. They are committed to making the ICD a beacon for child development specialists around the world. "In Romania, I've seen how quickly science can be translated into policy," says Nelson. "I can no longer do research without asking, how will this impact the lives of kids?"
Nelson hopes the ICD's research will translate into programs and social policy that encourage every child to flourish, transforming Romania's tragic legacy of child abandonment into one of hope.
To learn more about supporting Charles Nelson's PhD's, work in Romania,
please contact Sara Kelly in the Children's Hospital Trust 
at (617) 355-2562 or sara.kelly@chtrust.org.