Safety Assessment/Safety Plan

Brief Description

The Safety Assessment/Safety Plan is a tool used to identify and document immediate risk to children in families where abuse/neglect allegations have been accepted for investigation through the referral process, when the children remain in the home. If one or more item on the assessment questionnaire is indicated, then a Safety Plan is required. Safety Plan is an agreement between DCFS and the caregiver(s) which provides a plan to ensure the safety of the child(ren).

To return to the top, click your cursor anywhere on this page and press the Home key on your keyboard.

CREATE A NEW SAFETY ASSESSMENT/BROWSE WORKER CASES

1. Click button, select Worker. This Browse window will automatically display your Worker ID. To look up another Worker ID, highlight the Worker ID, type the Worker ID.

2. Click OK.

3. Click Worker Cases from the Options list. Once your Open Worker Assignment to Cases list displays, right click on desired Parent Case ID (Case ID).

4. If the following criteria is not met, expect to see the Error message displayed below.

• Your Referral must have a Subject indicated.
• Your Referral must have a Victim indicated.
• Your Referral must have a risk tag of 3 or higher.
• Or the Assessment has been done.
  

5. If you get this message, click OK. Go back into your Referral and meet the above criteria and try again to Send to a new Safety Assessment.

SAFETY ASSESSMENT - SELECTION WIZARD

1. The Selection Wizard will automatically start, select the Referral, Subject/Caregivers and Victims information to continue with the Assessment.

2. Select Referrals.

A. Check the box under the Select column (see orange box on graphic below) to relate that Referral to the Safety Assessment.

B. Select referral(s) to be assessed, more than one referral can be selected if they were received within 90 days of each other.

C. Click Next to continue or Cancel.

3. Select Subjects/Caregivers

A. Check the Select column to relate Subjects/Primary Caregivers to the Safety Assessment.

B. You can then click (Pre) Previous to return to previous page, or click Next to continue or click Cancel.

A. Click on the Select column to relate Victims to the Safety Assessment. You can then click Previous to return to previous page, or click Finish to close this window.

B. You can click on Selection Wizard once you have finished, to deselect and reselect other Referrals, Subjects/Caregivers and Victims.

SAFETY ASESSMENT - GENERAL TAB

The General tab will display the information that you have populated in the Selection Wizard.

1. The Assessment ID is an automatically generated number. The Worker ID & Name are automatically filled in. The Assessment Input Date is the date that the assessment was done. The Case ID & Name are automatically filled in. The Case Name is a combination of the Person Information and Referral Information.

2. Assessment Performed Date, click on the drop down arrow to the right of date. Click on left and right arrows to scroll to next or previous months.

Tip: You can also click and hold down curosr on the Month Year to scoll by month and year.

Once you have found the specific date, click once to select, (see day outlined e.g. June 17, 2002 in this example.) You can also click Today to use today's date or Clear to select another date.

3. Check All Children at risk have been placed or Unable to Locate Family if appropriate. If this is checked, the system will automatically mark Assessment Complete. Once you click Save, the supervisor is automatically notified by email that the assessment is complete.

4. The Person and Referrral are read only information that comes from the Selection Wizard.
5. Click and type information in the Medical Provider text box. This is a open text box. You can access Spell check by clicking on the Spell icon or pressing F7.

SAFETY ASSESSMENT - ASSESSMENT TAB

1. If any questions are "Indicated", Children's Administartion policy requires a Safety Plan in the absence of compelling reasons to the contrary. If any questions are "Indicated" then Supervisor Approval of Assessment is required.

2. If any questions are Indicated and no Safety Plan is implemented, explain why by clicking No Plan and typing your explanation. Supervisory approval of lack of a Safety Plan is required.

A. No Plan. The No Plan button is available only if there is at least one Indicated item, and Assessment Complete has been checked. Use No Plan when completing an Assessment. The No Plan text box has a Save button on the bottom left. However, the text doesn't actually get saved to the database unless the assessment itself is saved.

3. Assessment Questionnaire

• 1. Has there been an incident of high-risk physical abuse, sexual abuse, or neglect of any child in the family in the last 90 days? Include current investigation.

Any incident that rises to the level of the high-risk examples given in the ASSESSMENT OF RISK - Section1 of the Companion Guide requires an answer of "indicated" on this question.

• 2. Does a caregiver of any child within the family or a person with frequent access to the child have a history of serious violence toward children, history of sexual abuse of children, or a history of exploitation of children?

Adjudication is not required. Victims of previous violence or abuse do not necessarily have to be the child named in the current referral.

• 3. Is there a pattern of neglect/incidents/injuries involving any child in the family, which is escalating in severity?

Although this question is primarily conncected with CA/N related incidents, the worker is reminded not to discount a series of injuries that may have been labeled "accidents" but which continue to escalate in severity.

• 4. Have there been dangerous acts (including severe domestic violence), omissions, or plausible threats by a caregiver or person with frequent access to the child that have placed the child at risk or serious harm in the last 90 days? Include current investigation.

Adjudication is not required. Consider offenses involving substance abuse, gangs, and other actions that may be considered "child endangering".

• 5. Is there a caregiver whose judgement, impulse control, reality contact, and/or ability to parent is severely impaired at the present time due to substance abuse, mental illness, developmental delay, or other condition?

This determination relies mostly on observation and/or input from credible sources including friends and family members.

• 6. Is there an individual with frequent access to the child who is a Registered Sex Offender or who has been convicted of a felonious assault in the last five years?
  
  
• 7. Does the child express fear of people living in or frequenting the home?

Such fear must relate to a real likelihood of CA/N in the near future and/or retaliation by the caregiver for the child's cooperation with CPS.

• 8. Is there any concern that places a child in this home at risk of serious and immediate harm?

This questions is intended to allow the worker to include any dangerous situations, actions, and/or omissions that are not addressed in the previous question. Explain:

• If Indicated is checked, the Explain button will be available. Type text to explain your answer. Click Save to continue.
  

SAFETY ASSESSMENT - PLAN TAB

1. The following is an agreement between DCFS and, type in the name of the Caregiver(s) participating in the Safety Plan.

2. Reason for Agreement - Type a brief summary of the reason for the Safety Plan.

3. Safety Plan - Describe the area(s) that must be addressed immediately (and by whom) to protect the child(ren). If there is a Safety Plan, the Social Work Plan Complete box needs to be checked and the Supervisor Approval of Plan needs to be approved independently from the Assessment Questionnaire. This is a required field.

4. Next Safety Plan Meeting, click the down arrow to access a calendar. Scroll through calendar, click on date on calendar, the date will display in box. You can use your arrow keys to toggle through past and future dates. Select the Date of the Next Safety Plan Meeting if one is set. Click Check here if no planning meeting is required.

5. Check the Social Work Plan Complete box, when the Safety Plan is complete.

6. Supervisor Approval of Plan. The supervisor will check this box when the plan has been approved.

7. Click Save to save this Assessment information.

Note: The Safety Assessment/Safety Plan can be saved at any time throughout its creation.

8. Once the Supervisor Approval of Plan has been checked, the worker will receive an email similar to below.

SAFETY ASSESSMENT - INSTRUCTIONS TAB

1. If the child is not in out-of-home placement, this Assessment is to be completed immediately following the initial face to face contact with the child and documented per CA policy. This assessment is based on the information available at the time of its completion.

2. If any of the questions are answered "Indicated" the child will be considered at risk of serious and immediate harm. Serious and immediate harm means the child is in danger of CA/N which could result in death, life endangering illness or injury requiring medical attention or result in traumatic emotional harm or severe developmental harm which could have lasting effects on a child's well-being. "Indicated" means that based on the available information, the worker believes the statement is likely true. "Not Indicated" means that based on the available information, the worker believes the statement is likely NOT true OR the available information does not permit the worker to draw a conclusion whether the statement is likely true or not likely true.

SPELL CHECK

1. Press the Spell icon to access the Spell check or press F7.

2. While in a memo or text field, click Spell Check. You do not have to highlight text before you use spell check.

3. You may Add to expand your computer's dictionary base to include CAMIS terminology. Click Ignore/Ignore All, or Change/Change All to skip or change to suggested spelling.

4. Click Cancel if you do not want to continue.

UPDATE BEFORE SUPERVISOR APPROVAL OF ASSESSMENT

1. At any time prior to the Supervisor checking Supervisor Approval of Assessment, the worker can uncheck Assessment Complete, make changes, then recheck Assessment Complete.

2. Each time the Assessment Complete has been checked or unchecked, the worker will need to Save.

3. The worker can make changes while the Supervisor Approval of Assessment has NOT been checked.

ASSESSMENT COMPLETE

Step 1. Once the worker checks Assessment Complete, an Outlook email message (generated by CAMIS) is sent to the Supervisor alerting them that the Assessment has been completed and is ready for supervisor approval.

Step 2. The supervisor receives the email indicating which Assessment ID has been completed. The supervisor opens that Assessment ID in CAMIS. After reviewing, the supervisor can either check Supervisor Approval of Assessment or send an email to worker stating what is still needed.

Step 3. If the supervisor does not approve, they will inform the worker what is still needed by email. The worker can then go into that Assessment ID, select Assessment Complete and finish or modify the text or entries. Select Assessment Complete, repeat Steps 1-4.

Step 4. If the supervisor approves of the Assessment ID, they will check Supervisor Approval of Assessment.

SUPERVISOR APPROVAL OF ASSESSMENT

1. If the Safety Assessment and Safety Plan have both been approved, you can not change, edit, modify, update that original information. If you need to make a change or update the information, you will need to Create a Revision. A revision is a copy of the original Assessment information, saved with a new Revision number and date. The original Assessment information is preserved.

2. The supervisor will receive an Outlook e-mail when the worker selects, Assessment Complete and/or Plan Complete. The e-mail identifies the Assessment ID, Worker ID, Case ID, and Referral information.

3. The supervisor clicks Open, selects Assessment, type the Assessment ID number.

4. From the assessment, the supervisor clicks the Assessment tab, and reviews the assessment questionnaire. If the supervisor approves, the supervisor will check the Supervisor Approval of Assessment box.

5. If there is a Safety Plan, the supervisor clicks the Plan tab, and reviews the Safety Plan. When the Plan is approved, the supervisor will check the Supervisor Approval of Plan box.

NOTE: If there is a Plan, the Assessment questionnaire and the Plan must be approved separately.

6. When the supervisor approves the Assessment/Plan, the worker will receive an Outlook e-mail informing the worker that the approval has occurred.

7. If the supervisor does not approve, then the supervisor will need to communicate with the worker.

8. An approved Assessment/Plan is a permanent record, and the Assessment/Plan can only be revised through the Revision process.

9. If one or more items have been marked Indicated in the assessment, and the worker selects No Plan, the worker is required to explain why there is no Safety Plan. The supervisor needs to review the explanation by clicking the No Plan. If the supervisor desires, he or she can add text in the Supervisor's Response to No Plan.

CREATE SAFETY ASSESSMENT/PLAN REVISIONS

To see Policy regarding Safety Assessment, click on hyperlink Revisions for Safety Assessment.

1. When the workers gets an email message saying that the Assessment Plan has been approved, the Safety Assessment is locked. If a revision is needed, open the Safety Assessment.

2. The Create Assessment Revision button is now available. Click Create Assessment Revision to create a revision.

3. A message will display saying, "A new Safety Assessment Revision has been created and saved. You may now edit this new revision. To restore the previous revision, you must right click and delete this revision."

4. To create the revision, click OK.

5. You will be able to make any edits to this new revision of the original Assessment. The Assessment ID does not change, the revisions are numbered and dated.

REVIEW ASSESSMENT REVISION HISTORY

1. Right click on the Assessment ID number.

2. Select Browse Assessment, click Assessment Revision History.

3. The revision history is displayed with current revision at the top of the Browse window.

DELETE ASSESSMENT REVISION

1. To delete a revision created within the past 24 hours, right click anywhere on the Safety Assessment window, select Delete Revision.

Click on this text to view the new Business Rules for Deleting a Safety Assessment Revision.

BROWSE ASESSMENT REVISION HISTORY

To view the Assessment Revision History:
1. Click Browse, select Worker
2. Click All Assessments.
3. Click Safety Assessment ID
4. Click Options - select Assessment Revision History.

Click Options, to view these hyperlinked Browse sections will display on the left:

• General Browse - This displays the Referral ID, the Person ID, Name, Primary Caregiver, Roles & CA/N.
• Questionnaire Browse - This displays the question text and the answered selected.
• Assessment Revision History - This displays a list of revisions by number and by date.
• Safety Plan Browse - This displays the Plan create date & author, status, agreement between parties, goal of agreement and a complete description of the Safety Plan.
• Action Logs - This displays the date, time, user and action text for each Gui Alerts created, Assessments created or updated, and Safety Plan.

The Assessment Revision History option will display the revieisons by number and date. The most current revision will be listed first.

SEARCH ALL ASSESSMENTS

1. Click Search, select All Assessments.

2. This will allow you to select the following search criteria:

• Office ID
• Unit
• Worker ID
• Start Date
• End Date
• Investigative Assessment
  - Completed Within 90 Days
  - Founded
  - Unfounded
  - Inconclusive
  
• Safety Assessment
  - Indicated
  - Safety Plan
  

3. Type the criteria that you want to search by. The more information entered, the more narrow the search results. The search results will display in the area below the search criteria, see orange outline in graphic below.

4. Type the desired criteria for Office ID, Unit, and Worker ID. When selecting a Start Date, click the drop down arrow to see a calendar. You can click on Today to use the current date. Click Clear if you have clicked the wrong date. Click on the date. You can use the left and right arrows to scroll through the months. You can also click on the Month between the arrows to scroll quickly through the months and years.

5. Investigative Assessment

You can only select one of the following options:

A. Check the box next to Completed Within 90 Days if you wish to select all assessments Completed Within 90 Days. This overwrites the other check boxes.

B. Check the box next to the appropriate Findings to limit your search to Founded, Unfounded or Inconclusive.

C. Safety Assessment, check the box next to Indicated or Safety Plan if appropriate.

6. Click Search to start the search.

7. Click Clear to deselect your search criteria and type other criteria.

8. Click Reset Display to reset the Assessment list to the original setting.

A. The Assessment list is sortable and the column headings are movable. Just click on the heading, drag and place it where you want it to be. Notice the arrow to the right of the Heading title. The arrow indicates the ascending or descending order, click to change the order.

Note: The column heading must stay within the column heading area, you will see this symbol , warning you that you can not move into any other location.

B. When you are in the appropriate area to move the column heading you will see two green arrows, indicating the new placement. (See below graphic, in this example, the Date is moved over two columns to the left)

C. By dragging a column heading to this location, you can group by that column. This allows you to only preview the information from the column headings you've selected in a drill down method. In the example below, the first drill down column heading is Assessment Type, then Assessment ID, then Approved status then Overall Risk level.

9. Click To Excel

A. You can also save the search results into an Excel spreadsheet.

i. Click To Excel, once you have performed the Search. This action will launch Excel with the search results in a spreadsheet.

ii. To Print this spreadsheet, click File, select Print. You can also use the shortcut (Ctrl + P) to get the Print dialog box. Click Ok to print.

iii. This will allow you to print more information than is printed on a Screen Print. You may also save the spreadsheet onto your personal network drive or other location. Saving is not highly recommended because the data is only as current as the date you print the spreadsheet.

iv. Once Excel has opened up, click File, select Save As. Give it a meaningful name and select the location. Close to return to CAMIS.

 

BROWSE ALL ASSESSMENTS DETAILS

1. To Browse All Assessment Details, click Browse, select Worker.

2. Click All Assessments Details from the Options list.

3. Right click on any Assessment ID, select Browse (e.g. Safety 5234) . If you select the Browse option with the arrow to the right you will be able to choose the individual Browse Page sections. Select one of the following Browse Page selections:

• General Browse
• Questionnaire Browse
• Assessment Revision History
• Safety Plan Browse
• Action Logs

Note: There is another Browse (e.g. Safety 5234), this essentially gives you the same options as the first Browse.

DELETE A SAFETY ASSESSMENT

There is no Delete Assessment function in GUI.

PRINT SAFETY ASSESSMENT

1. Click Print .

2. Select one of the following Print options:

A. Select Screen Print to print out what you see on the screen.

B. Select Safety Plan to generate a Safety Plan.

C. Select Safety Assessment/Plan to generate a Safety Assessment/Plan report.

D. Select Blank Assessment/Plan to generate a blank Safety Assessment/Plan.

3. Click Ok or Cancel.

SUPERVISOR INSTRUCTIONS FOR APPROVING SAFETY ASSESSMENTS

Here's how to find all the CAMIS information CPS supervisors need when considering approving a Safety Assessment and Plan. This handout guides you in opening the Safety Assessment and reviewing the related referral and SERs.

Let's start with a quick review of how to find all the Assessments created in your unit.

1. Click Search select All Assessment.

2. Type the Office ID and Unit number in the appropriate fields. Type a Start Date (12 months is the maximum it will allow) from which to begin your search. Under Safety Assessment click both the Indicated and Safety Plan checkboxes to see all your unit's assessments. Then click Search to start the search.

3. Opening Safety Assessments

On any Assessment in the list, right click and select Open Assessment ID (e.g.4929). This will allow you to see what the worker has filled in on this assessment.

4. Open the Referral

A. Go back to the Assessment list and right mouse click the Safety Assessment that you're working with, select Related to Assessment, then select Referrals.

B. Click Open to view the Referral. If there is more than one you will need to pay attention to the Received date to find the most relevant referrals.

5. Opening Service Episode Records

Note: All CPS investigative service episode records should be related to the Referral number.

A. Return to the list of your unit's Safety Assessments, right click on a specific Assessment and select Related to Assessment, select Cases.

B. This will bring up the Case number and other associated information. Keep this Case number in view for the next step. Notice the Cases related to Assessment ID (e.g 11683) is in the blue title bar at the top of this window.

6. Click Open , select Service Episode Record, select Case ID.

7. Type the Case ID number, this window should still be available in the background of your CAMIS windows.

8. Click Ok.

9. Here's the counterintuitive step to get the most readable, chronological view of SERs. Once you have the list of SERS, click Print and then click Print Preview All SERS.

10. The picture below is how the SERs view will be displayed. Just scroll down to read all the SERs related to a given case or referral.

APPLICATION SETTINGS

These settings allow you to customize the way the GUI application looks on your desktop.

1. Click Tools, select Application Settings.

2. Under the General settings , there are four options:

A. Other

i. Auto Maximize Forms: The default is set to 800 X 600 (default - standard size), 640 X 480 (larger size) and 1024 X 768 (smaller size).

Note: If Auto Maximize Turned Off is selected, the Selection Wizard windows will Not be maximized. It is recommended, that you select
800 X 600.

ii. Search Options: If you click this option, then all search forms (business search, worker search, etc.) will automatically close after you send.

iii. Tabsheet Options: This allows you to change the appearance of the tabs throughout the application.

a. Tab Styles - use the drop down arrow to choose your selection.

Standard Tabs
Button Tabs
Flat Button Tabs

b. Tabs on Multiple Lines. If this box is checked the tabs will stack in front and behind each other, instead of scrolling to the right to view more tabs.

iv. Hint Duration in Seconds. Place your cursor in a field you want to find more information on, hold cursor over that field for a couple of seconds. There will be a popup window with text giving descriptions for that field. Use the up and down arrows to increase or decrease the time that a hint is displayed. The default is set to 30 seconds.

In this example above, the No Plan field has been clicked and the cursor held over the field for a couple of seconds to view this popup window.

Note: Not all fields have Hint text developed yet.

B. Text

i. Font for Text Areas. Select a font from the drop down list and an appropriate text size. See the Example Text box to view your selection.

ii. Show Mono-spaced font only. Check this box if desired. While you are free to choose any font listed as your text area font, there is one caveat. When choosing a proportional spaced font the text areas will behave a little strangely as words wrap to the next line. To prevent this behavior, you can choose a mono-spaced font. Checking this box will only display mono-spaced.

C. Data

i. Files. Select individual table you wish to be refreshed when the table is updated. If a user refreshed data in CAMIS GUI, data changes made in Classic CAMIS won't be present in CAMIS GUI until the weekly update is done by CAMIS staff. You can also click Select All to select all tables listed. Click Refresh Selected to refresh the updated table.

Here are the tables you can select from;

• Washington City Zip
• City County Table
• Action Log Action Codes
• Invalid Names
• Law Enforcement Agencies
• Office List
• Schools
• Tribes
• Regional Administrators
• Area Administrators

3. Under the Modules Settings, you can select either Referral or Assessment.

A. Referral

i. Ripple Reminder.

When Ripple Reminder is checked you will be reminded to do an address ripple on the referral if all the following are true:

· Either Default or Incident address has changed.
· None of the persons involved are marked for address ripple

ii. Click Apply or Ok to continue, you can click Cancel to quit this setting.

B. Assessment

i. Matrix Grouping - This will affect the Matrix tab information on Reassessments, Reunification and Investigative Assessments. By Characteristics - This is the default system setting. If you check this, it will list the Person ID in the first column and then by Characteristics in rows.

a. By Characteristic - If you check this, it will list the Characteristic in the first column and then by Person IDs in rows.

b. By Person - If you check this, it will list the Person IDs in the first column and then by Characteristics in rows.

ii. Override Wizard Filters - When Wizard Override is checked, the Assessments Wizard will show all available data (for testing purposes).

iii. Auto-Size Grid Row Heights. When Auto-size is checked, the data entry grids for the Risk Matrix will automatically expand when you enter text. If not checked, then the grid rows will stay the same height.

4. Disconnect - Reconnect. When a user has a change in security, click Tools, select Disconnect. Make the appropriate security related changes, click Tools, select Reconnect. This will refresh the user security settings.

A. Click Apply or OK to continue or Cancel to cancel making any application settings.