Concurrent Planning (2): the Rollercoaster of Uncertainty' (Report‪)‬

This article by Jenny Kenrick focuses on the impact of intensive contact with birth parents for the carers of infants placed by concurrent planning. It follows an earlier article focusing on the infants placed (Kenrick, 2009). Among the themes to emerge are the uncertainties intrinsic to the process and how far these affected the development of carers' attachments to the infants they were looking after. The importance of the carers' direct knowledge of the 'real' birth parents for helping the children to develop an understanding of their identity is also noted. Finally, an interview with a birth parent whose child returned to her is reported. Concurrent planning (CP) is a scheme in which both rehabilitation to birth parents and adoption are worked on concurrently, with intensive resources deployed for each alternative. The child is cared for by foster carers dually approved as prospective adopters, while at the same time having regular contact with birth parents. CP originated in the USA in the 1980s (Katz, 1996); Monck and her colleagues have described the UK projects, including that based at Coram, London (Monck et al, 2003). (1)