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This study was designed to investigate the needs of Occupational Therapy for the parents of handicapped children. The questionnaires have been mailed to 268 parents of the handicapped children aged 1 to 18 years. 134 answers replied were analyzed, and the findings were as follows;
1. Of the 134 subjects, 71(53%) were the mental retardation, speech disorder 8.2% and physically handicapped 7.5%.
2. The types of class that the handicapped children were attending were special school class(32.1%), general class(29.9%) and special class(22.4%). And the grades of the children were elementary school below 3rd grade(38.1%), up to 6th grade (16.4%), and high school(15.7%).
3. Almost of the subjects 124(92.5%) wanted some kinds of rehabilitation programs. Anyhow 28(20.9%) subjects engaged in the therapeutic programs at hospitals.
4. Supposedly those subjects are treated at the regional health offices, 98(73%) willingly pay the fee at the amount of 5,000 to 10,000 Won.
5. The preferred items of rehabilitation needs for the handicapped children were bathing(3.16±0.78), improving endurance(2.98±0.82), practicing number concept(3.41 ±0.78), concentrating attention(3.42±0.61), developing friendship(3.43±0.63), skill for child treat and education(3.39±0.55).
From the above findings it was concluded that the parents of the handicapped children strongly wanted the Occupational therapy programs in the regional health offices. Also their needs were diverse, thus the occupational therapist was considered as the most satisfactory mediator for their needs. It seems clear that the quality of life of the handicapped children and their parents shall be highly developed when the OT services such as practicing for sociality development are applied to the respective regional health offices.