Kinship care refers to the care of children by relatives or, in some jurisdictions, close family friends (often referred to as fictive kin). Relatives are the preferred resource for children who must be removed from their birth parents because it maintains the children’s connections with their families.

Previously known as a Home Evaluation or a Relative Care Assessment, a Kinship Care Assessment assesses the appropriateness of a potential kinship relation to serve as a placement for a child when that child’s parents cannot adequately care for the child.