The Wiltshire DART – Digital Assessment and Referral Tool

Lucy Lewis

Why change anything? • 55% of Early Help referrals come in by alternative mechanism to SARF

• Children are being assessed and re-assessed

• 80% of assessment and referral questions across the Early Help Sector are the same,

but each service has its own paperwork

• Less than 20% of Early Help referrals are for children with a CAF/MSP, despite complexity of situations and need for multi-agency responses

• CAF register is small and shrinking, especially for over 12’s.

• Professionals are increasingly frustrated at unclear/inconsistent pathways and

thresholds

• Recording and visibility of the child’s journey was inconsistent

What do we want to achieve? • Reduce ‘reassessment’ of children and families.

• Support professionals’ understanding of service thresholds and whether further

assessments or screening is required.

• Divert inappropriate referrals headed for council services, including the MASH.

• Encourage a ‘what can I do first?’ culture.

• Reduce the burden of paperwork on professionals trying to create holistic and consistent assessments of need.

• Provide greater oversight of who we are supporting, where, when and why.

• Provide commissioning intelligence pressure points, trends and demand sources.

What is the DART? • Online early identification/screening tool

• Bespoke questionnaire based on user’s concern about a child or young person

• Pre-defined responses support consistent application of threshold

• Answers used to build action plan – Signposting? Further assessments? Referrals?

• Safeguarding concerns identified based on MASH threshold

• Requirement for CAF/MSP enforced where need identified

• Answers used to create bespoke action plan - signposting, further assessments, direct referrals or requests for support (where appropriate).

• Reportable information on presenting factors and levels of concern based on child’s age, area and school.

• Oversight of case loads, nature of support requests and sources of requests by agency.

Next steps • Pilot phase April 2017

• Invitations to 37 settings, 3 children’s centres and 1 district specialist centre to pilot the DART

• Test sessions with school nurses, health visitors and speech and language Detailed feedback on usability, function, time commitment and thresholds

• Final development stage Summer 2017

• Launch planned for October 2017 in line with new Children’s Services Case

Management System.

Screenshot: Child’s details

Screenshot: Landing page

Screen shot: Category page

Screen shot: Questions

Screenshot: Summary of assessment

Screenshot: Sources of support

Screenshot: Next steps