Reorienting intensive family preservation services in relation to public child welfare practice

Despite broad support for family preservation as a policy, an approach to service delivery, and a program model, sufficient knowledge has accumulated to warrant reconsidering the use of intensive family preservation programs in public child welfare practice. Based on an integrative review of the child maltreatment and family preservation literature, the current rationale for programs-the prevention of placement-should be abandoned, and a new rationale should be developed. One such approach is articulated, including specification of new roles, goals, and target populations for intensive family preservation programs.