Thirteen families were recruited from a range of specialist
services for children with CP to enable strategically focused
recruitment of participants [20]. All were based in Victoria,
Australia, including RCH, Yooralla (a community-based agency
providing services to children and adults with disabilities), the
Cerebral Palsy Education Centre (a specialist education service
for children with CP), Melbourne, and the Kids Plus Foundation,
Geelong (an organisation providing services to children with
neuro-physical disabilities). Families were recruited through (i)
flyers and the first author (C.M.) approaching eligible families
prior to their child’s outpatient appointment at RCH and (ii)
therapists providing eligible families with the information statement
and consent form.
Families were eligible if parents had sufficient English
language skills to participate in an interview, and children had a
primary diagnosis of CP and were aged between 4 years, 5 months
and 10 years. This age limit was chosen as children participate in
similar activities within this age range. Children with a range of
communication abilities were recruited. Data collection occurred
concurrently with data analysis [23] enabling the incorporation of
additional questions on emerging ideas. Recruitment of families
continued until data saturation was reached. Data saturation
occurred when the researcher was no longer identifying new
themes in the interviews with parents [24]. Clinical and demographic
characteristics of the child and family were reported by
parents, as detailed in Table 1.