Children living with parental substance misuse: A cross‐sectional profile of children and families referred to children's social care

Abstract

Parental substance misuse is a significant public health and children's rights issue. In the United Kingdom, social workers frequently work with children and families affected by substance misuse. However, relatively little is known about this population, particularly at point of referral to children's social care. This paper reports on the largest known study of parental substance misuse as a feature of children's social care work in England. The paper provides a cross-sectional profile of 299 children living with parental substance misuse and referred to children's social care in one local authority in England. Data were collected from social work case files at the point of referral to social care about the child, family, the wider environment, and parental substance misuse. The findings show that children affected by parental substance misuse frequently had other support needs relating to their well-being and mental health. Children were also likely to be experiencing other parental and environmental risk factors. The significant historical-and in some cases intergenerational-social care involvement for some families indicates potential issues with the capacity of services to meet needs. Recommendations for practice are discussed with a particular focus on the need for early, comprehensive support for children and families.

Parental substance misuse and statutory child protection in England: Risk factors and outcomes

“…At point of the index referral, children's ages ranged from unborn to 17 years (Mdn = 6, Mean = 6.4). Full descriptive details of the sample are available in Roy (2021). Every child in the sample had at least one episode of involvement with CSC.…”

“…This ESRC funded study was a retrospective longitudinal cohort study of 299 children all living with PSM and all referred to CSC in one local authority in England between March-July 2012. Further detail on methods can be found in (Roy, 2018(Roy, , 2021. Quantitative and qualitative data were collected from social work case files about each child.…”

“…An extensive review of existing empirical research and theory (Roy, 2018) guided data collection. Information was collected about child and family demographics, parental substance misuse, procedural information and outcomes, and risk and protective factors relating to child welfare.…”

“…Information was coded from qualitative information on case files about subdomains of the Assessment Framework relating to parenting capacity, and family and environmental factors. The focus of this data collection was whether concerns or support needs had been identified in the sub‐domains (see Roy, 2021, for further information).…”

The co-occurrence of substance misuse, domestic abuse, and child maltreatment: Can Family Drug and Alcohol Courts play a part?

“…This severely limits understand of the issues and the possibility of developing tailor-made services that recognize the interconnections and complexity of the issues. The largest, and most recent profiling of cases involving parental substance misuse in an English local authority, found that of the 299 children referred to children's social care, 42.8% were also exposed to DA ( 57 ). Risk, or actual abuse and neglect, were the most frequent reasons for referral.…”