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Child protection in Sweden: are routine assessments reliable?
Madeleine Cocozza1, Per A Gustafsson, Gunilla Sydsjö
1Division of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Linköping University, Linköping, Sweden. madeleine.cocozza@lio.se
Aim:
To study the validity of the decision not to investigate mandatory reports of suspected child maltreatment.
Methods:
Written files of 220 reports indicating possible child maltreatment were analysed and re-evaluated. As a measure of the justification for the decisions, a 5-y follow-up study was done.
Results:
We determined that 76% of the reports still indicated child maltreatment after the initial assessment was done. In the follow-up study, 45% of the children had been investigated. The social worker used the family as the only source of information in 74% of the cases, in 6% someone outside the family was contacted, and in 11% no further information in addition to the report was collected. In 9%, data on information sources were missing.
Conclusion:
The findings are rather discouraging, as they challenge the belief that a report is a means of ensuring that maltreatment does not continue. The study shows that, depending upon the way in which the initial assessments are made, maltreated children may run a risk of not being identified, even though the maltreatment has been reported. This suggests that there may be a need for national guidelines concerning the reporting of maltreatment.
