Caring for an adult son or daughter.

What's different about caring for an adult child with disabilities

Caregiving for a child with a developmental disability, autism, Down syndrome, cerebral palsy, intellectual disability, or complex medical needs is a lifelong commitment — and people who haven't done it underestimate what that actually means. You have decades of medical history, dozens of specialists, every IEP from kindergarten through 22, every transition plan, every state waiver application, and a working knowledge of the disability services landscape that took you years to build.

The hard inflection points aren't the diagnosis — you've been past that for a long time. They're transition to adult services at 18 or 22, the move into supported employment or day programs, the decision about guardianship versus supported decision-making, the establishment of a special-needs trust so government benefits aren't lost, and — the one nobody wants to name — succession. Who takes care of our adult child when we can't anymore.

And the medical system keeps treating your adult child as a new patient at every specialist visit. You re-recite the same complex history. You bring the same folder of papers. You answer the same questions you answered last year at the other practice.

What Kintaria does for you

A complete medical history, finally in one place. Decades of labs, procedures, hospitalizations, immunizations, medication changes — woven into a chronological timeline. New specialists see the story in a few seconds instead of asking you to recite it.

The document vault for the paperwork that decides everything. Guardianship orders, special-needs trust documents, ABLE account paperwork, IEPs and transition plans, state waiver approvals, advance directives, insurance and Medicare/Medicaid cards. Encrypted, organized, OCR-searchable, and ready to share with a new doctor, a new attorney, or a new program coordinator with a time-limited read-only link.

Share with a provider. A new neurologist needs the relevant history. A new behavioral therapist needs the IEP. The dental practice that finally takes Medicaid patients needs the medication list. Generate a scoped, expiring read-only link in seconds — they see exactly what you chose, nothing more.

Family members + roles, built for succession. Add your spouse as co-owner. Add a sibling who will eventually take over as caregiver. Add the day program coordinator as an observer. Each person gets the level of access that matches their actual role. When the time comes to transfer primary caregiving, the workspace transfers with full history intact — not as a binder shoved across a kitchen table.

Bilingual workspace for multigenerational households. If your parents are also involved in care (grandparent generation), or your adult child reads more easily in a non-English language, every note is automatically translated so everyone reads in the language they understand best. Same record, side-by-side.

What parents in this situation tell us they need

From conversations with families: a way to consolidate decades of records that currently live in seven banker's boxes in the garage. A medication list that includes the rationale for each med (so a new doctor doesn't de-prescribe something that's been hard-earned). A succession plan that their other adult children can actually use. A way to bring siblings into the loop gradually rather than dropping the entire decades-long context on them at once. And the legal paperwork organized in a way that an attorney can pick up and run with.

Playbooks for this situation

Step-by-step plans for the transitions families like yours navigate over years. Each starts with a short intake — five to eight questions about your adult child's specific situation — and personalizes from there.

• Transition · Age 18 to 22

  Your adult child is aging out of school-based services.
• Legal · Before the 18th birthday

  You need to set up the special-needs trust and guardianship.
• Succession · For the family

  When the parent caregiver can't anymore.
• Foundation · 30 minutes

  Lock down your workspace security.

See all playbooks →

Caring for someone else? An aging parent · A spouse · A sibling