The purpose of the study was to examine the effectiveness of an intervention for parents of children with disabilities in a controlled study focusing on parents’ self-efficacy, psychological well-being and perceptions of change in children’s sleeping, eating and mobility. The Training and Support Programme (TSP) was designed to equip parents with a simple massage skill that they could use with their children in the home environment. Parents were trained in massage by therapeutic massage therapists in eight weekly sessions, each lasting 1 h. The sample comprised 95 parents (49 in the intervention group, 46 in the waiting-list control group) who attended the TSP with their children. Data were collected by self-administered questionnaires at baseline (before commencing the TSP) and at 8-weeks follow-up.

The TSP demonstrated statistically significant positive effects on parents’ anxious mood, self-efficacy for managing children’s psychosocial well-being, self-efficacy in giving massage therapy and perceptions of children’s sleeping and eating. Relatively high levels of psychological distress were found among parents, particularly mothers.