Udomiteljstvo djece u Hrvatskoj iz perspektive udomitelja i stručnjaka
Foster care in Croatia from the perspective of foster parents and professionals

Summary/Abstract: In many official documents of the Croatian Government and relevant government departments concerning the process of deinstitutionalization, foster care is cited as a priority form of non-institutional care. The purpose of this paper is to describe the process of foster care for children in Croatia and to present the results of research conducted with foster parents and experts, in the form of improving foster care. The entering into foster care process begins with a motivation and a decision of potential foster parents to embark upon the journey, followed by completing of an application to the local social welfare center, selection carried out by the team which oversees the foster care process, training of foster parents before they obtain a license to perform foster care, and finally – the placement of the foster child in the foster family. The research was conducted with foster parents (N=6), social workers (N=3) and psychologists (N=3), thereby respecting the plurality of various viewpoints. Data was collected with a semi-structured interview and then qualitatively analyzed using the thematic analysis. Analysis of the data showed that foster parents and experts are generally satisfied with the actual process of adopting and that foster parents have help and support from their family and friends. Some of the guidelines that participants in the study pointed out as possibilities of improving foster care are related to the increase of available information on foster care, the change of legislative framework, the professionalisation of foster care, and as an important problem they highlighted the lack of experts working in the foster care system.

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