The Members of Adoption Counts, through STAR Procurement, are seeking to implement a Flexible Procurement System of approved providers who can deliver a range of therapeutic services or assess a family, individual or child’s need to help identify an appropriate therapy. These services may be funded through The Adoption Support Fund www.adoptionsupportfund.co.uk or other sources of funding.

An assessment of need which requires a more specialist skill set or discipline which cannot be delivered within the Regional Adoption Agency or Council resources. This need will have been identified appropriately by the Regional Adoption Agency or Council.

A specialist assessment can be identified as the following:

An in-depth, specialist assessment undertaken by a qualified clinician(s), for example, a child psychiatrist, clinical psychologist, that is intended to result in a therapeutic support plan for the child(ren) / family;

A specialist assessments may be undertaken by a single qualified clinician, or as part of a multi-disciplinary team;

Multi-disciplinary assessments may consist of contributions from several different professions who have different areas of clinical expertise, training, and/or experience and provide a more holistic assessment of the child and family’s needs.

Delivery of an intervention identified as a result of an assessment. We expect providers to hold the relevant professional qualifications from a recognised body, to deliver the identified therapeutic support.