Collaboration of Child Protective Services and Early Childhood Educators: Enhancing the Well-Being of Children in Need

Information sharing between the dental healthcare and child welfare services regarding child maltreatment-A repeated cross-sectional study in Norway

BACKGROUND

Little is known about dental healthcare workers reported suspected child maltreatment to and received inquiry from the child welfare services (CWS).

AIM

Assess time lag differences in public dental healthcare workers' information sharing with CWS and identify sociodemographic and attitudinal covariates of information sharing with CWS in 2014 and 2019.

DESIGN

In 2014 and 2019, a national census of 1542 and 1791 Norwegian dental health care workers, respectively, were invited to participate in an electronic survey. Of them, 1200 (77.8%) and 1270 (70.9%) replied to the questionnaires. Time trends of reported child maltreatment and received inquiries were estimated and adjusted for sociodemographics, attitudes, trust, and collaborative routines in logistic regression analyses.

RESULTS

The likelihood of reported child maltreatment to and received inquiry from CWS was higher in 2019 than in 2014 (OR 1.4 [95% CI 1.2-1.7] and OR 1.1 [95% CI 0.9-1.4]). Significant associations occurred with sociodemographic characteristics, attitudes, and collaborative routines. The likelihood of receiving inquiry about whether being employed long versus short term was higher in 2019 than in 2014.

CONCLUSION

Information sharing between dental healthcare workers and CWS improved across time and might promote beneficial outcomes.

Providers' experiences collaborating with child welfare workers: The good, the bad, and the impacts

BACKGROUND

Successful interprofessional collaborations have been identified as a potential solution to mitigate problems associated with negative outcomes for clients involved with the child welfare system. The barriers to collaborative relationships need to be better understood and effectively addressed.

OBJECTIVE

To understand the characteristics, barriers, and facilitators of collaborations between different types of providers and child welfare workers, as well as their impacts.

PARTICIPANTS AND SETTING

Mental health professionals, foster and kinship parents, legal professionals, and other providers responded to an online survey distributed in a Northeastern State of the United States of America.

METHOD

Participants (n = 208) completed the Quality of Collaboration with Child Welfare survey. Qualitative responses were analyzed by three coders using three levels of axial coding with constant comparison.

RESULTS

Participants identified different aspects of communication, relationships, and follow-through as key elements of successful collaborations, as well as the items most likely to interfere with their formation. Providers differed somewhat in how concerned they were with various aspects of collaborations in accordance with their professional roles. Barriers to successful collaborations included both individual and systemic factors which often resulted in negative outcomes. Overall, more negative experiences were offered than positive ones.

CONCLUSIONS

Strategies are needed to improve communication, promote positive relationships, and address systemic barriers to enhance collaboration and, in turn, improve outcomes for child welfare-involved clients.

What matters in low-threshold collaboration? Perceptions of interprofessional collaboration between education and social and healthcare professionals in Finnish primary schools

This study examined the factors linked to low-threshold interprofessional collaboration in the context of Finnish primary schools. The main purpose of the study was to analyze how education and health and social care professionals perceived their mutual collaboration. The PINCOM-Q scale was used to identify factors related to interprofessional collaboration in professionals' work settings. The results indicate that individual factors such as work motivation and personal power are prominent in low-threshold collaboration. At the group level, communication has an important role to play in interprofessional collaboration. Professionals (n = 204) perceived mutual exchange of information as an important aspect of working together. The aspects that matter in the low-threshold mode of interprofessional collaboration are a complex combination of individual, group and less obvious organizational factors, all of which both reflect and are reflected in an individual's motivation and commitment to cooperation. The establishment of long-term and systematic low-threshold, interprofessional collaboration presupposes that individual interests are realized in good interaction in equal encounters between different organizational domains.

Assessment of Parent-Teacher Relationships in Early Childhood Education Programs During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Relationships between families and schools are important in the educational experiences of young children. However, the COVID-19 pandemic that began in 2019 and spread rapidly around the world disrupted many families, teachers, early childhood programs, and other child-support institutions. There is much to be learned on how this pandemic specifically affected parent-teacher relationships. This study examined whether parent, teacher and other program characteristics had an impact on early childhood parents' ratings of the quality of their relationships with teachers. Results suggest that parent's education, income, age of child, location of the center and distance learning availability, impacted how parents perceived their relationships with teachers. Supporting parents' home environments may be one effective strategy for promoting positive relationships between parents and teachers in times of challenges.

Addressing challenges at the intersection of early intervention and child welfare

BACKGROUND

The Keep Children and Families Safe Act amendment to the Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act (CAPTA) of 2003 mandated children under age three who are involved with Child Welfare (CW) to receive a referral to the system for early intervention (EI). While there is strong rationale for providing developmental services to young children and families impacted by maltreatment, the early implementation of this policy brought about many challenges related to interagency coordination and readiness of providers to provide cross-systems care. Currently, as the system and providers within the system recover from the effects of Covid-19, a predicted increase in need of services may exacerbate historical gaps in the provision of services to families involved with CW.

PARTICIPANTS AND SETTING

This policy-focused paper explores issues impacting CW and EI providers who coordinate care between CW and EI services.

METHODS

This paper provides a historical examination of these challenges and proposes an approach for improving developmental services for families referred from CW, specifically through the lens of addressing resources and supports available to providers.

RESULTS

The proposed approach includes an increase and reprioritization of resources to support provider readiness and well-being.

CONCLUSIONS

By focusing on support for providers, the authors propose a reduction of stress and improvement of services at each level of the "well-being" system.