Guidelines for caregiving practices are for child protection professionals: MSF

SINGAPORE - Guidelines by the Ministry of Social and Family Development (MSF) spelling out appropriate caregiving practices for parents and children are meant for professionals in the child protection system who work directly with at-risk families.

These include children who have experienced or are at risk of abuse, neglect or harm, said a spokesman for the ministry, who was responding to queries on the intended users of the guidelines and experts consulted in the process.

This follows

a report by The Straits Times on Dec 5

on the first such guide for practitioners, providing recommendations in areas such as expressing affection, privacy and toileting. The guidelines were announced at the Asian Family Conference in November.

The “guidelines on healthy family boundaries” say, for instance, that it is inappropriate for parents to bathe their child of the opposite gender regularly when they can do so independently, and to force a child to show physical affection to someone they are uncomfortable with.

The guidelines are intended for social service practitioners from family service centres, child protection specialist centres, healthcare professionals like paediatricians and medical social workers, as well as school counsellors and student welfare officers, said MSF.

The ministry said the guide came about as it had received reports or queries from professionals and parents about whether some parenting practices were appropriate in its child protection work.

These included a parent who showered an eight-year-old child of the opposite sex when the child was able to bathe independently, and a parent who slept alone in the same bed with a 13-year-old child of the opposite sex despite the child’s discomfort.

While the parents said they were not aware that they were causing any harm, MSF or the professionals involved had to advise them to maintain healthy boundaries with their child, said MSF.

“The examples show that sometimes, due to lack of awareness of clear family boundaries, parents’ practices may inadvertently make their child more susceptible to harm in other contexts such as schools and other social settings,” it added.

For example, if a child is consistently pressured by their parents to hug or kiss someone they are uncomfortable with, it could condition the child to suppress their feelings and make them less likely to report other people who make them feel uncomfortable.

The ministry said it will disseminate the guidelines to child protection professionals to ensure a consistent approach to safeguarding children.

The guidelines are not intended to be enforced or prescriptive across all parenting contexts, but instead to serve as an additional parenting resource for practitioners, it added.

For families that face special circumstances, such as those with an older child with a disability or a single parent, professionals will help the family to ensure the child’s daily care needs are met while maintaining healthy family boundaries.

MSF took about a year to develop the guidelines in consultation with subject-matter experts, such as paediatricians from KK Women’s and Children’s Hospital (KKH) and the National University Hospital (NUH), religious leaders, social workers, as well as the Education Ministry’s Guidance Branch, which oversees school counsellors and student welfare officers.

This was to ensure the guidelines were practical for families in the child protection system, said the ministry.

MSF’s Child Protective Service (CPS) investigates cases involving serious abuse or neglect of children and young persons.

For situations that do not require statutory intervention, CPS may refer the families to community-based child protection specialist centres for counsel and support. These may include, for instance, parents who use inappropriate or excessive discipline, but are willing to get help and improve on their parenting methods.

For families facing high emotional and economic stress, CPS may refer them to family service centres and other social service agencies for caregiving support, financial assistance or counselling to better cope with stressors and provide adequate care for their children.

One of the experts MSF consulted in developing the guidelines was Dr Peter Wong Choong Yi, senior consultant at the department of emergency medicine at KKH.

He said the guidelines help parents to understand how best to avoid situations where there is a risk of inappropriate interactions, or actions that may be psychologically harmful to children, even if well-meaning.

Dr Wong, a member of the hospital’s Suspected Child Abuse and Neglect team, said the guide will help paediatricians to better advise parents and to be more aware of “red flags” to look out for when working with children and families, to identify any concerns of inappropriate family interactions that may be harmful to a child.

He said he has also encountered many cases of alleged child abuse in his work as a paediatrician, where a parent felt unjustly accused as their interactions with the child were well-meaning. “If these guidelines are accepted and applied, many of these situations may be avoided,” he said.

Dr Wong added: “As a parent, I want to know how to avoid situations that may be harmful to my children’s dignity and well-being, even though there is no intention of harm. I want to show affection in appropriate ways, which my children appreciate, rather than feel uncomfortable with.”