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Effective: 6/12/2026

G1.9 Working With Service Providers

Legal Authority

Introduction

​​​​​​​​​​​​​Effective ongoing communication and collaboration between the SSW and Department for Community Based Services (DCBS) service providers are imperative to strengthen assessment, inform decision-making, provide support to children and families, and ensure coordination and efficiency in service provision, thereby promoting safety, permanency, and well-being. 
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Practice Guidance

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Outcomes for children and families improve when parents are active participants in the assessment, planning, and service delivery processes. The SSW can provide encouragement and support, including engaging parents, identifying barriers to their participation, and, when possible, removing the barriers. The SSW can also work closely with service providers to ensure that needed services are accessible to families in the community.  

When contact occurs with service providers outside of scheduled face-to-face visits, the quality of the contact is more important than the method of contact. While a telephone call allows for real-time, two-way exchange of information, email may also be used at times for contacts and to discuss progress, as long as it ensures a professional, two-way exchange that adequately addresses progress, successes, and concerns. 


Procedure

​The SSW:

  1. Identifies, with the family team, needed services and supports, and makes referrals that could assist:
    1. The family to improve the safety, care of, and relationship with their children; or
    2. The parents’ ability to fulfill their roles to promote family safety, permanency, and well-being; and
    3. The child in achieving developmental milestones and addressing any physical or mental health needs. 
  2. Locates the most appropriate service providers in the community (or outside the community, if there are limited resources) once service needs have been identified through the assessment process by considering the following issues: 
    1. The services offered;
    2. The agency’s flexibility in scheduling;
    3. The affordability and accessibility of services for the family; and
    4. The family’s identification of community resources that have or have not been beneficial in the past;
  3. Presents service options to the family and individual family members, who are offered the opportunity to choose a provider when possible, ensuring that the youth has a voice in choosing their services; 
  4. Ensures that the DCBS-1 Informed Consent and Release of Information and Records and/or the DCBS-1A Informed Consent and Release of Information Supplement is completed once the provider is chosen and follows guidelines for HIPAA compliance;
  5. Attends appointments, whenever possible, with the service provider, alone or with the family, as necessary to ensure continuity of treatment goals;
  6. Gives the service provider information regarding the reason for the Cabinet for Health and Family Services (CHFS/Cabinet) involvement with the family, the assessed strengths and needs of the family, and a copy of the most recent family case plan, if appropriate;
  7. Maintains (at a minimum):
    1. Quarterly face-to-face contact with service providers, including the court-appointed special advocate (CASA), to assess the family’s progress towards achievement of case goals, objectives, and tasks; alleviation of risk to the children; and
    2. Monthly quality contact by telephone or email, if no face-to-face visit is scheduled, with the treatment/clinical staff at a private child caring facility (PCC) or hospital facility, to assess the child's progress toward achievement of case plan goals, objectives, and tasks, and document the content of the contact in the case record; 
  8. During the referral process, inquires about the provider’s agency policy and procedures regarding providing written reports, and explain that there is the possibility that they may be asked to testify in court on behalf of the child, family, or the Cabinet;
  9. Follows guidelines for ongoing contact with the child and family, and documents in service recordings the progress toward goals, objectives, and tasks;
  10. Ensures that critical early childhood services are provided for children under the age of five (5), including high-quality early care and education, developmental screening, early intervention if needed, and regular well-child checkups. For older children, ensures the educational, health care (including mental health), and independent living needs of the child are met by following the guidelines in the appropriate SOPs, and by reviewing the out-of-home care (OOHC) case plan;
  11. Follows guidelines for critical situations as appropriate, which include the following:
    1. Serious illness or death of a child;
    2. The child’s absence without leave (AWOL);
    3. Possession of a deadly weapon by a child;
    4. The child is an alleged victim, or perpetrator, of:
      1. Abuse;
      2. Neglect;
      3. Physical assault; or
      4. Sexual assault;
    5. Alleged criminal activity by the child requiring notification of law enforcement;
    6. Suicide attempt of a child; or
    7. Emergency placement or hospitalization of a child in a:
      1. Crisis stabilization unit;
      2. Medical hospital; or
      3. Psychiatric hospital;
  12. Continually assesses and documents whether services provided are helping the family to:
    1. Identify strengths, competencies, or resources to promote the safety and well-being of the family, and to prevent unnecessary out-of-home care or hospitalization of a child;
    2. Reframe problems in new and more helpful ways; and
    3. Formulate solutions to specific problems;
  13. Includes service providers in family team meetings (FTMs) and case conferences with the family whenever possible;
  14. Follows up with court involvement, as necessary, and provides updates to the citizen’s foster care review board as requested;
  15. Follows the appropriate guidelines for service delivery in addressing the following special casework services:
    1. Family preservation program;
    2. Weatherization program;
    3. Preventive assistance; and/or
    4. Safety net.
  16. ​Seals references to a positive test for a non-prescribed controlled substance for a woman who:
    1. Enrolls in and maintains substantial compliance with both a substance misuse treatment or recovery program and a regimen of prenatal care as recommended by a health care practitioner throughout the remaining term of her pregnancy; and
    2. Achieves cer​tified completion of the treatment or recovery program; or
    3. Has achieved substantial compliance with a substance misuse treatment or recovery program within six (6) months after giving birth, whichever is earlier.






​Footnotes

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Documents

Revisions

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