Children’s Focus Case Study - Case Management Framework Assessment Answer

Internal Code: 1AHABI

Children’s Focus Case Study Assessment Answer

Assignment Task: Specialist Homelessness and Domestic and Aboriginal Family Violence Services (SHS) Homelessness Strategy Division, Housing SA, Department for Communities and Social Inclusion July 2013. A mother with two boys arrives at your service ‘Westside’; she has been living in a car for two weeks while travelling down from Alice Springs. You notice quickly that both boys are acting out with the eldest (aged 10 years) intimidating and threatening his youngest brother (aged 4 years). The youngest is grossly overweight, timid and appears anxious and does not respond to you. The mother informs you she is depressed, couch surfing with a relative for the next few days and can’t control her boys, stating they “don’t listen”. That afternoon the family have been given short-term accommodation in a hotel until something more suitable becomes available. The SHS case worker gives Together 4 Kids (T4K) a ring to arrange a child-focused assessment as soon as possible. Intake - During the intake process it is important to recognise the unique experience that homelessness has on children. Explain to the mother that you would like to seek the support of the specialist children’s service,T4K, to help work out how to best respond to her children and to better support her as a mother. Ask for her written permission to call them. In contacting the children’s service, T4K, you organise a time to have the children meet with them and provide this information to the mother in writing and ensure she has transport to get there. Talk with her about how long the appointment is likely to take and with whom she will be meeting. Reiterate the importance of this appointment in helping her to better manage and support her children, and let her know you will call her the day before the meeting to remind her of the appointment. Where possible, offer to attend the appointment with her thereby providing a point of continuity between services. Complete your intake for the mother and the boys and refer the children for a service on H2H to the specialist children’s service. Assessment - The next week the mother arrives at Westside with her two boys for the T4K appointment. After introductions and ensuring the boys feel safe, the boys are offered opportunities to play in a separate room with the support and guidance of a children’s therapeutic worker. This is to provide the mother time alone with another T4K worker to complete a child focussed assessment. Much of the assessment is about understanding her perspective as a parent with what is happening with her children. After the child focussed assessment, the T4K worker discusses the mother’s perceptions and any observations gathered during the play session. It is agreed that T4K will provide a therapeutic service for both boys, as their behaviour has been identified as a possible response to recent trauma. Ensure that this information is used to help inform your assessment of all life domains for both the mother and the children. Work from a strengths perspective and highlight the strengths of the clients. Case planning -  Work together with T4K to develop a case plan. Clarify the roles of your service as lead agency and that of T4K in providing a therapeutic service to the children. Talk with T4Kabout goals and strategies to achieve them, and time frames around this, including periods for review. Ensure both agencies are providing consistent messages to the mother and her children about how the case plan will help guide the support services around her. Ensure the mother and the children (throughT4K) have the opportunity to contribute to the case plan by helping to identify their goals, needs and strengths. T4k has access to the whole case plan as long as a task for a service is allocated to T4K. Implementation of case plan The eldest child commences one-on-one sessions with T4k at home after school. They work through a customised program to develop emotional literacy and positive social skills. The specialist children’s service also provides informal education and skill development to the mother in regards to therapeutic parenting. It’s important that you as the lead agency and T4k worker keep in close communication, to avoid duplication and ensure the case plan is being implemented smoothly. It’s also an opportunity to keep informed of other stakeholders and who is liaising with them. For example, the specialist children’s service may be the primary contact for the children’s school so that they can support the specialist children’s service’s contact with the child and progress in this area. The youngest boy has a one-on-one appointment with a specialist children’s service worker. Westside provides therapeutic services as part of the holistic case plan. The specialist children’s service worker will work with the lead agency (specialist homelessness service) to ensure that other aspects of the case plan are completed to support the therapeutic service such as organising a dietician appointment for the mother and son at the Women’s and Children’s Hospital and helping the mother to organise appropriate meals for the children’s school lunches. Monitoring - It’s essential that collective input from you and other stakeholders help to monitor progress and respond to changes. Ensure that regular meeting times are set up to discuss progress with the specialist children’s service and other key stakeholders. Maintain a high level of communication with all involved, especially the mother and her children. Be flexible around strategies should critical changes occur. For example, you may at some point need to involve new stakeholders. In this case a Child Abuse Report Line (CARL) report is completed by you as the case manager, when you discover the eldest boy has not been attending school. You talk the matter over with the specialist children’s service to help inform the CARL reporting process and keep the service informed on any child protection concerns or responses as they develop. This is especially important to the specialist children’s service as it may affect how they work with the children. Evaluation, transition or exit The eldest boy moves in to an eight week group program run at the school by specialist children’s service and the School Counsellor. During this time you have been able to secure long-term sustainable housing for the mother and her children, and a local community support service has taken on case management. It’s important to ensure an extended transition period to introduce the mother to the new agency and their workers and to provide a detailed handover to the service. Make sure you continuously review how the transition is going and check that the mother and children are comfortable with the intended closure. Discuss your closure/exit plan with the specialist children’s service and introduce them to the new case manager. As the lead agency for this family you close the case. However the eldest boy is still in the specialist children’s service program so it is also necessary that the child specialist service close their service on the life domain in the case plan (group program). The SHS provides a case plan exit and closes the case. The specialist children’s service can now become the lead agency for that child (but this can only happen when the case has been closed by the specialist homelessness service), and the group work program can continue. After the eldest boy’s group program is complete, all progress and other case notes are completed on H2H and the specialist children’s service close the case plan on H2H. If the mother asks or needs to engage with your service in the future, there is the option of reconnecting them with the specialist children’s service if needed.

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