Program priorities of crippled children's agencies: a survey.

State Crippled Children's (CC) programs are known for their diversity in organization and varying coverage of diagnostic categories. Relatively little information is available concerning the programmatic priorities of CC agencies. To identify the activities central to the mission of State CC agencies, a survey was undertaken. Results from the survey revealed considerable unanimity among CC directors in identifying activities deemed to be very important to their agencies' missions. However, CC program directors indicated that their agencies were unable to spend sufficient amounts of time working on many of these activities. With few exceptions, the same activities were accorded high priority regardless of the particular organizational type of CC program and regardless of the tenure of the director. Directors of CC programs were also consistent in identifying activities that were relatively less important to their agencies' missions, including activities related to community-based care. Together with improvements in the treatment of childhood chronic illness, changes in the availability and financing of specialty medical care have substantially altered the problems that now face State CC programs. Despite major differences across the State CC programs, survey results reflect a broad consensus among CC directors concerning the current role of their agencies in the care of children with special health needs. Such a consensus may be an important element in gaining the additional resources needed to address current problems and to ensure high quality of care for these children and their families.