Clover Lodge pro­vides a ther­a­peu­tic milieu in which chil­dren can receive “ther­a­peu­tic re-par­ent­ing” from well trained and sup­port­ed staff. The ther­a­peu­tic care pro­vid­ed is con­sul­tant-led, using the the­o­ret­i­cal basis of Attach­ment The­o­ry.  We meet as a staff group in each home on reg­u­lar basis with our Con­sul­tant Child Psy­chi­a­trist to review the pre­sen­ta­tion of the chil­dren we look after. Using attach­ment the­o­ry, we analyse each child’s attach­ment behav­iours and styles and for­mu­late our prac­tice respons­es.  In this man­ner, we are able, as a group, to think very sim­i­lar­ly about the deliv­ery of our ther­a­peu­tic care, as well as have a shared under­stand­ing about our young peo­ple.

This mod­el of con­sul­tant led care fol­lows the mod­el of ther­a­pist led care found in Dyadic Devel­op­men­tal Psy­chother­a­py (DDP), a term first used by Amer­i­can Clin­i­cal Psy­chol­o­gist Dan Hugh­es to describe the style of ther­a­peu­tic inter­ven­tion between ther­a­pist, car­er and child in place­ment. Suc­cess­ful clin­i­cal stud­ies of Dyadic Devel­op­men­tal Psy­chother­a­py have estab­lished this style of inter­ven­tion in the Unit­ed King­dom, and it is now wide­ly taught as a pro­gramme by organ­i­sa­tions such as Fam­i­ly Futures. Our Con­sul­tant Child Psy­chi­a­trist, Dr Les­ley Ash­by, is trained in DDP at lev­els 1 and 2.