Annual family gathering for children with disabilities

• Event enhances interaction between families and officials in the centre
• Provides opportunity to review the development of the children

The Dubai Early Childhood Development Centre (DECDC), an initiative of Community Development Authority (CDA) organised its annual family gathering for children with disabilities who are currently enrolled with DECDC and their parents.

His Excellency Khaled Mohammed Al Kamda, Director General of CDA, Chief Executive Officers and senior managers from different departments of the organisation attended the event.

“The family gathering was aimed at enhancing communication and cooperation between officials of CDA and DECDC with the parents, with the objective of evaluating and discussing the progress made by their children. The event also aimed at providing insights into new Initiatives that are being introduced at the center,” said Al Kamda.

The families that attended the event expressed their satisfaction with the activities of DECDC. They said that these family gatherings helped in the promotion of stronger interaction, and hoped more of such events would be held in the future. A series of entertainment activities were organized for the children.
“Strengthening communication with the families of children with disabilities enrolled at the centre is one of our important commitments, to extend continuous support,” said Dr. Bushra Al Mulla, Director of DECDC. “DECDC is a unique early intervention program, and the first in the Middle East to offer community-based trans-disciplinary services to children with disability or at risk for developmental delays, as well as to their families.”

Dr. Bushra also expressed her gratitude to the Al-Futtaim Group for their continuous support towards the Centre and their generous sponsorship of the event through providing gifts to children from (Toys R Us).

DECDC was established after a long and extensive benchmarking exercise of best practice in early intervention programs across the world in addition to literature review and research activities in the field of early intervention and disability.

Furthermore, a gap analysis study and a current situation analysis of disability were conducted in Dubai. All results indicated that there was a lack of early intervention services available in Dubai for children from birth to six years at the time.

This urgent need resulted in setting up DECDC, a one of a kind early intervention center, which is the first in the region and the third in the world to offer such services based on the AEPS (assessment, evaluation and programming) system.