In-home parent training, treatment of migraine headaches, and marital counseling as an ecobehavioral approach to prevent child abuse.

A low-income family received in-home treatment after the mother expressed a desire to kill her daughter. The ecobehavioral approach focused on stress reduction of the frequency and duration of the mother's migraine headaches, on parent-child training, and on behavioral marital counselling. Follow-up data 1 yr after the beginning of services indicated maintenance of improvements in all areas. This was sufficient to terminate services. Also, the mother reported that she no longer had any negative feelings about her child, and the home environment lacked the stressors originally seen when the counselors began treatment. Finally, a consumer satisfaction questionnaire indicated a high level of satisfaction by the couple about the services offered by Project 12-Ways, an ecobehavioral approach to the treatment and prevention of child abuse and neglect.