Yuba County Health and Human Services is investing in new technology with an app called Traverse, which uses artificial intelligence to gather and document key case information that child-welfare caseworkers use to make critical decisions.
Caseworkers will use the Web-based app in the office to scan and upload documents and a companion app to easily take photos and complete forms during home visits. All the data and content is automatically analyzed by Traverse using artificial intelligence to extract critical information about a case, helping caseworkers make better decisions about case management.
"With the shift in California to implement Continuum of Care Reform, we are focused on reducing the use of congregate care and increasing capacity in home-based placements for youth," explained Karleen Jakowski, deputy director of the agency. "In order to effectively locate home-based placements, we need to identify and connect with extended family members and existing natural supports who we can revisit as a potential placement. Currently that information exists in a two-foot-tall paper case file. To read through that volume of paperwork and get a good picture of the youth's history and potential supports for home-based placement is very challenging."
Further challenging the agency is the fact that data about the 193 children currently in Yuba County foster care is split between California’s online case management system and paper case files.
"CWS/CMS is an electronic system, but we have to supplement that with large paper case files full of collateral information, particularly for kids who are in permanency care and may have spent years in foster care," Jakowski said.
The agency will equip 35 child welfare staff with the Traverse app to collect, view and share case content, according to a news release from Northwoods, which makes Traverse and other custom solutions for agencies dealing with aging, child support, child welfare and economic assistance. "The technology will help caseworkers manage the volume of content in case files so they can focus less time on manual paperwork and more time doing high-value work with children and families," the company says.
Julie Mahon, program manager for the county's Child and Adult Protective Services, likes the ability of caseworkers to perform so many more tasks in the field, quickly and efficiently.
"What interested us about Traverse is the artificial intelligence feature. When a worker is out in the field investigating and needs to find out what interventions occurred in the past, the worker can have exactly what he or she is looking for in seconds. We can access critical information that can make or break a decision out in the field.”
What's ahead?
"My hope," said Jakowski, "is that Traverse will put more information at staff’s fingertips to get children and youth in the most appropriate and beneficial setting possible and, ideally, placed with people who they are connected to. That’s where we see the best outcomes for children and youth and can prevent the added trauma of multiple placements.”
Northwoods says its solutions are used by nearly 45,000 caseworkers across the country "to manage, collect, view and share content and data more efficiently."
County HHS Using App to Gather Data, Track Child-Welfare Cases
The program, called Traverse, has drawn praise from Yuba County officials, who say it will help caseworkers do their jobs more efficiently while helping with data gathering, sharing and storage.
