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Comparing Outcomes for Youth Served in Treatment Foster Care and Treatment Group Care

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Abstract

This study compared youth in the Florida Medicaid system prior to entry into treatment foster care or treatment group care, and compared outcomes in the 6 months after treatment. Florida Medicaid data from FY2003/04 through 2006/2007 along with Department of Juvenile Justice, Department of Law Enforcement, and involuntary examination data were used to examine youth receiving out-of-home treatment. Propensity score matching was used to examine the effect of out-of-home treatment on outcomes. Males, older youth, and youth with prior involuntary examinations, felony charges, misdemeanor charges, or inpatient psychiatric treatment were more likely to be placed in treatment group care. Treatment foster care placement was more likely for youth with prior treatment foster care episodes. Propensity matching results indicated that youth in treatment foster care had greater reductions in felony charges, and were less likely to return to out-of-home treatment in the following 6 months. While often placed in group care settings, youth with prior criminal justice encounters, especially for felony charges, may be better served in treatment foster care programs.

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Notes

  1. Treatment foster care programs have also been called therapeutic foster care and specialized foster care in the literature, and treatment group care has also been referred to as therapeutic group home care and group home care. We refer to the programs as treatment foster care and treatment group care to be consistent with the majority of the literature.

  2. Out-of-home treatment is also provided through a facility-based residential program, the Statewide Inpatient Psychiatric Program (SIPP). This paper focused on youth served in community-based settings. To be clear, similar to treatment foster care, treatment group care is a community-based setting; but similar to SIPP’s, treatment group care is also a residential treatment setting.

  3. The numbers of involuntary examinations and criminal justice contacts during the prior 12 months were also used with similar results.

  4. Another alternative was to use hierarchical linear modeling to account for the multiple treatment episodes for youth, and the multiple observations per group home. Most youth however, only had one episode, and while there were multiple observations per group home there were typically few (or one) observation per foster home.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Mental Health Law and Policy, Florida Mental Health Institute, University of South Florida, 13301 Bruce B Downs Blvd., Tampa, FL, 33612, USA

    John Robst

  2. Department of Child and Family Studies, University of South Florida, Tampa, FL, USA

    Mary Armstrong & Norin Dollard

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  1. John Robst
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  2. Mary Armstrong
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  3. Norin Dollard
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Correspondence to John Robst.

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Robst, J., Armstrong, M. & Dollard, N. Comparing Outcomes for Youth Served in Treatment Foster Care and Treatment Group Care. J Child Fam Stud 20, 696–705 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10826-011-9447-2

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