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Integration of Services Training Series

Service Integration & Service Integration & CollaborationCollaboration

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Goals: Module 5: Service Integration and Collaboration

• Deepen understanding of Service Integration and Collaboration in practice.

• Identify and explore DCM/Investigator role, competencies and practices that advance Service Integration and Collaboration.

• Identify and explore existing and potential supports to children and families with complex conditions and issues.

• Strategize to improve individual and system service integration and collaboration.

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Defining our Terms

• Integration of Services, or Integrated Services: incorporation [of services] as equals into society or an organization of individuals of different groups (Webster’s Dictionary)

• Collaboration: to work jointly with others or together especially in an intellectual endeavor (Webster’s Dictionary)

• Teams: a number of persons associated together in work or activity. (Webster’s Dictionary)

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System Partners

• A Few External Partners:

– Child Care

– School

– Children’s Medical Services

– Department of Juvenile Justice

– Workforce Development

– Mental Health Providers

– Substance Abuse Providers

– Domestic Violence Centers

• A Few Internal Partners:– Investigators– DCMs– Supervisors– CWLS– Program Specialists

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Goals for Plans Using the Recovery Model

• Respect for the child and/or family preferences regarding treatment and providers, whenever possible.

• Focus on developing recovery supports (services, informal supports, long term plans).

• Identifying and making efficient effective plans for co-occurring issues.

• Building a plan to support caregivers in providing safety, stability and well-being for children for their childhood.

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Small Group Activity

In your small group discuss:

When things go well, what are the benefits you experience in working collaboratively with the following:

– Parents

– Providers and Educators

– Friends and Supports

– Agency Staff, DCM, Supervisor, Investigator, and Specialist

What are the challenges or worries you have had or dealt with in including these partners in meetings?

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In twenty years…

“What would the children say?”

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Session 2: Objectives

• Identify practices and competencies to implement collaborative, family centered practice.

• Review of the Practice Wheel.• Develop Strategies for Partnership and

Collaboration across the Practice Wheel.• Identify the role of the worker in helping

families become independent and functional after our intervention.

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Progression of Teaming

• Where are you in your practice?

• Where is the local system?

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Cooperative Teams, Not Silos

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Family Centered Practice Model

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Giving people fish….

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Giving People Fishing Poles…

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Teaching Families to Fish….

SchoolSchool

FriendFriend MentalMentalHealthHealth

GALGAL

FamilyFamily

LeaderLeader(PI or CM)(PI or CM)

Cooperative

Extended Extended FamilyFamily

Peer Support Peer Support GroupGroup

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Session 3: Objectives

• Identify impact of specific issues and conditions on parenting.

• Identify formal services and supports that can increase child safety, permanency, and well-being by condition/issue.

• Consider the importance of services and supports along the continuum of the change process.

• Emphasizing service and team responsibility for safety assessment.

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• The condition is part of an underlying dynamic that led to allegations and verification of child abuse and neglect.

• The condition may not be ‘cured’, but management and recovery within this condition could allow for safe and stable family life.

• Managing and recovery from this condition is worthwhile in order to preserve the child’s attachment and identity, when safety can be created by the family and their supports.

How Conditions impact Safety: Or ‘Why are we Here in the first place?”

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What we need to know….

• How the conditions in this family impacted this child.

• What it will take to manage the condition, and to resolve what can be resolved, so that child maltreatment does not recur.

• What it will take from the services and supports to provide recovery assistance when vulnerabilities in this family come up again in the future.

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Health and Development

• Key factors that impact safety in the Health and Development Domain:– Parent ability to physically and emotionally meet

the needs of the child based on the child’s developmental phase.

– Child ability to receive the specific care the child needs for optimum development and growth.

– Family ability to cope with and minimize toxic stress for optimal functioning and safety.

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Mental Health Issues

• Key factors around child safety related to mental health can include:– Episodes or ongoing impairment in parents’ ability

to meet children’s needs.

– Challenges for parents who are raising children with demanding mental health issues.

– Ongoing needs for advocacy on behalf of children with emotional disturbance in the community.

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Domestic Violence

• Key factors to consider in families where there is Domestic Violence are:– Direct danger to children who are parented by a

batterer.– Danger of being exposed to and present during

violent episodes.– Impact of witnessing and living with a batterer.– Impact of witnessing harm and life-threatening

situations against the survivor.– Assuring safety during and after intervention.

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Substance Abuse Issues

• Key factors around child safety related to substance abuse can include:– Episodes or ongoing impairment in parents’ ability

to meet children’s needs.– Child(ren)’s exposure to dangerous people in the

case of illicit drugs or addicts in the home.– Danger of lapse and relapse in the future.– Underlying causes and triggers for

use/lapse/relapse and the addiction create future vulnerabilities for parents and children.

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Family Centered Practice Model

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Session 4: Objectives

• Apply concepts of integration and collaboration to building formal and informal teams around a family on your caseload.

• Identify strengths and needs for the family and set of services/team members in your case.

• Assess and plan for self and system around deepening practice in collaboration and integration to meet the complex needs of families we serve.

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Creating an Effective Service Array

• Providers know what they are doing.• Families can draw from formal services and

from supports to work on a unified and coherent plan.

• Providers know what other providers are doing and are conversant in the conditions that impact family functioning.

• The team of supports and services is basically on the same page.

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Focus of the Work

• We work together to keep children safe, take care of them, and support their lifelong sense of identity and belonging (permanency).

• The vehicle to reaching the outcomes is first and foremost to support and strengthen the family.

• When the family cannot provide the outcomes, the team of supports and the family hold the child in their hearts and minds to plan for her/his best outcome.

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Activity: Functions of the Practice Wheel

• What functions of the practice wheel are we in right now? (there may be more than one)

• How is this team addressing :– safety– permanency– well-being

• What are the services and supports that are most useful to this family right now?

• What more might I suggest we add to our work together, based on the family’s specific needs and their progress?

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Core Conditions of Helping and Engaged Practice

• Realness or Genuineness.

• Acceptance, trust, and valuing the person.

• Empathy and Understanding.

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What’s in it for Us?

DCMs and Collaboration:– Building more supports for families so that when it is time for closure,

the family has a ready network in place.

– Building in more help for transitions: getting others on the same page assists the child and family in making transitions without ‘getting the runaround’.

– More empowerment=Less direction by the DCM: the more families create and run their own plans, the less the DCM has to micromanage every task.

– Sharing the responsibility for safeguarding children: when the team has a shared vision of safety, and feels mutually responsible, this helps parents internalize safety and also provides more resources to provide safety.