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environment that facilitates optimal growth. This is why
interventions that focus on changing the relationships between
persons and their social environments, including interventions
for changing attitudes and stigmas, are requisite for the
improvement of the siblings’ quality of life.
Over the years, various organizations developed diverse
programs, from individual treatments, through group
interventions and group therapy, to community interventions,
with the goal of increasing the wellbeing of siblings of children
with disabilities.
These programs run the full gamut from short-term supportive
treatment, or cognitive behavior therapy, to long-term
psychodynamic therapy, from individual treatment to group and
family treatment. Research shows that treatments can be
combined or only one solution can be selected. The most
important thing is to provide a space for expression and sharing
(Sloan et al., 1975).
Beit Issie Shapiro’s programs for siblings and
parents
Beit Issie Shapiro is a family focused center, which works and
connects with the circles that surround the child with a disability:
the nuclear family and the extended family (parents, siblings,
grandparents and sometimes uncles and other family members).
Beit Issie Shapiro provides families with a host of solutions on the
individual, marital, familial and group levels, both at its daycare
centers – rehabilitative daycare center, kindergartens and special
education school – and through its Family Therapy Center for
emotional therapy.
Regarding brothers and sisters of children with disabilities, we
have developed over the years solutions under two main headings: