I would like to share my good feelings of my (but our) achievement on scientific domain of Early Childhood Intervention – I have received today the Certificate of Associate professor in Social Medicine and Management and to thank for all support my “Voinicel” and AHEAD-Moldova colleagues. “Voinicel” center is progressing as a scientific institution also and this is, in my opinion, a good “evidence-based” indicator of a positive evolution of things in creating Early Intervention Services in Moldova.

We are very glad that Ministry of Labor, Social protection and Family of Moldova is insisting in implementation the new approach (medico-social model) to people with disabilities and the team of “Voinicel” Center is a part of this process. Recently we have had a visit of supervising ICF-CY implementation in Comrat Center “Fidanjic” for children with disabilities.

Congratulation 1!

The Parliament of Moldova have approved ratification of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities

Center of Early Intervention “Voinicel” appreciates the really very important event for around 170 000 person with disabilities from Moldova. Finally, the Parliament of Moldova has approved ratification of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. Read more here.

Congratulation 2 Voinicel!

Additionally, Moldavian Government have recently approved the Strategy of Social Inclusion of people with disabilities 2010-2013, where the creation of Early Childhood Intervention services is one of the important goal. This event is a real argument for optimism and enthusiasm for “Voinicel” team.

Friday, 26 February, I was invited in the Municipality of Chisinau for a lecture on “Early Childhood Intervention for children with disabilities”.

The Municipal Department of Children′ s rights is supporting the initiative of creation a Centre of Early Intervention as a constituent element of Family Physician Center and, in this context, “Voinicel” team is invited to teach a new team in the field. We are very glad with this idea, because the number of children 0 to 3 years old, from Chisinau, children who need Early Intervention services, is much bigger that the capacity of “Voinicel” Center.

Additionally, this kind of Center can serve as a prototype of regional ECI centre for other regions of Moldova in creation the network of Early Intervention services in entire country in the future.

Today, 19th of February, Voinicel center was honored by Representatives from Open Society Institute Mental Health Initiatives, Budapest and Soros Foundation – Moldova.

Raluca Bunea, projects coordinator from OSI MHI confirmed the intention of supporting “Voinicel” activities of Early Childhood Intervention for next year and also mentioned an eventual possibility of developing new project in Early intervention Promotion trough implication of “Voinicel” team in collaboration with UNICEF Moldova and Social Investment Fund Moldova.

In my opinion, actual period it’s a decisional step for the future of Early Childhood Intervention (ECI) in Moldova. Nowadays, “Voinicel” Center is a Centre of Reference in Early intervention, with hundreds of beneficiaries children with developmental disorders and their parents, with practical research done in this field (I mean our dissertation “Elaboration of the Model of Early intervention service for children with disabilities in Moldova” –www.cnaa.md/en/thesis/8655/), with good experience in the field, with a nice and very professional team. Additionally, during last 5-6 years, we have done a lot of efforts for convincing Moldavian Ministry of Health, Ministry of Trade, Family and Social Protection, UNICEF, Mental Health Initiative Open Society Institute, Soros Foundation and other institutions in the need of ECI; there is also an impact on other institutions, like Medical University and Medical Colleges from Moldova, where we facilitated the implementation of a new Curriculum, containing topics on “Child with disabilities” and “Early Childhood Intervention” – in general, we are participating very active in creation of the positive attitudes in our society for implementation of early intervention services network in all the country.

More and more people understand now the need of changes in the approach on disabled people, more and more institutions are accepting the idea of collective efforts need in building the Network of ECI, supported by the State.

Now, I have a strong feeling that we need just 1 or 2 year more, a period of big collective efforts, for achieving something very important on the level of entire country in this domain, for enjoying first extensive results in Early Intervention in many regions of Moldova.

In this context, Voinicel team are very thankfull to all Norwegian people and Norwegian institutions for all kind of support in achieving this goal.