Parenting Capacity Assessments
Parenting Capacity Assessments (PCA) are comprehensive evaluations that identify a parent's or caregiver’s overall ability to appropriately care for children and includes an objective measurement of the adult’s parenting skills. All parenting capacity evaluations are conducted by Dr. Mills. He is a registered clinical psychologist and a Diplomate in Clinical Psychology and Psychoanalysis with the American Board of Professional Psychology, which is a recognition and certification of advanced competence far above the credentialing standard required in Ontario. It is the highest credential any practicing psychologist can achieve in North America. Dr. Mills has been a practicing clinician and consultant for the past two decades with a wealth of experience specializing in the assessment and treatment of childhood, adolescent, and adult psychopathology. He is also an expert in assessing attachment processes between parents and children and treating attachment disruptions, which is the subject matter of his ninth book, Treating Attachment Pathology.
Why use a Psychologist over a Social Worker? A psychologist has many more years of graduate and post-doctoral training, supervision, and clinical skill development than a social worker. A psychologist is trained in clinical psychodiagnostics and in the administration, scoring, and interpretation of psychological tests. Social workers, psychiatrists, and other mental health therapists are not. Custody and access determinations are one of the most important decisions any professional can make. The stakes are extremely high because they are ultimately about the psychological welfare of children. The end result is a major life event that impacts on the entire lives of everyone involved, and it has profound implications for children’s adjustment. Would you feel more comfortable with a social worker who has two years of graduate education or someone like Dr. Mills who has fourteen?

Uniform Parenting Evaluation Procedure Dr. Mills follows an impartial, non-biased, uniform assessment procedure and serves the regional Children’s Aid Societies, individual parents who are in need of parenting capacity assessments, and those in court and criminal proceedings. What distinguishes Dr. Mills’ approach from typical parenting capacity assessments performed by other mental health professionals is the depth and thoroughness of his evaluation procedure. He follows a uniform evaluation protocol where each identified caregiver is:

• Given a battery of psychological and cognitive tests
• Determines the quality of parenting capacity for each identified parent or caregiver
• Undergoes an attachment assessment with each child and parent in both office and home observations on multiple occasions
• Conducts an assessment of each child
• Provides a detailed report on the psychological and cognitive profile of each parent
• Addresses parent-child and relevant family dynamics
• Evaluates the interrelationships among each of the family members in question
• Provides attachment observation results
• Gives a clinical risk profile
• Specifies clear, decisive, and unambiguous recommendations regarding the referral questions, parenting strengths and deficits, and custody and access recommendations (when requested) that address the needs of identified agencies, individuals, or court goals