Improve Autism Rehabilitation Services by Providing Solutions Based on the Perception and Experience of Parents and Providers: A Qualitative Study

Children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) need a variety of services. One of the most essential needs of these children with ASD is the use of rehabilitation services. However, these services pose many challenges for these individuals. Providing strategies to solve these barriers is essential.

The purpose of this study was to identify strategies to overcome barriers to using rehabilitation services and improve them based on the perceptions and experiences of rehabilitation service providers and parents of children with ASD.

This study was conducted with a conventional qualitative approach. Twenty-seven participants were selected from rehabilitation service providers and parents of children with ASD based on purposive sampling with maximum diversity. Data were collected through semi-structured face-to-face interviews. The interviews lasted from July to December 2020 for 20 to 60 minutes and continued until the data was saturated. Data were analyzed with MAXQDA 10 software.

After the interviews, 1057 initial codes were extracted by deleting similar codes. Strategies for using rehabilitation services for these children with ASD were classified into 5 main categories and 20 subcategories, which are: Improving the level of knowledge and attitude, creating and strengthening a systematic support system, systematic rehabilitation policies, developing a comprehensive autism rehabilitation management program and facilitating access.

In previous studies, many challenges have been identified for all services for children with ASD. The findings of this study showed that considering facilitators to solve the existing challenges in order to use of rehabilitation services for these children with ASD and their families. Therefore, policy makers, service providers and managers need to be aware of the strategies collected and pay special attention to these issues. To achieve a more favorable situation, they should adopt and implement the necessary mechanism in the field of policy and planning, so that finally lead to fundamental steps to improve the rehabilitation services needed by children with ASD.