E.P.I.C

When we took the babies for their 15 month check up at the doctors office, she felt that they were lacking behind in development. She felt at 15 months, they should have a 4-5 word vocabulary and be almost running or walking backwards. We felt that they were still technically only 13 months old, not 15. The doctor's office made an appointment with E.P.I.C (Early Prevention and Intervention for Children). E.P.I.C program basically evaluates the development and physical skills of a child. They check to see if the child is behind on speech, hearing, coordination, etc. Our appointment was set up for December 1, 2011. Before we go to our appointment, I had to fill out 10 pages of information for each child... my hand was killing me by the time I was done. Most of them were all the same answers, but there were some that were different.

When we got to the appointment, we were assigned a Temporary Service Coordinator along with another Assistant. We went into a room that had a table for the adults and toys on the floor for the kids to play with.  One coordinator sat on the floor and played with the kids, while one stayed at the table and went over the information that I filled out before hand.

They worked with each child individually so they had 100% attention on one child. They would ask how many words they say, see if they could stack blocks, throw a ball, etc... Kevin and I didn't feel that they were developmentally behind and we told the coordinators that. They were kind of shocked that we were there if we didn't have any concerns. But we did tell them that the doctor felt that they were behind and that's why we were here.

After about an hour and half, we were finally finished. They scored a perfect score on motor skills and scored fairly high on everything else. When we left, Kevin and I thought to ourselves that they didn't need any help.

We got a phone call a week later saying that all 3 babies do not qualify and they do not need any help! What a relief that was!

If you need any information on the E.P.I.C program, please visit http://nichcy.org/babies/overview