Also included in the software are cost analysis and billing components. Assistant Controller Gregory Purachev, who has served as liaison between the software developers and the program coordinators, has developed a cost model for the activity-based costing as part of the new system. On the issue of outcomes, he has worked with program coordinators to learn what the outcomes should be in the various systems. Then we built the systems so they could manage the data effectively and efficiently. The innovative nature of the Kid Connection initiative is exciting to Director of Health Services Bea Barbera, who coordinates the doctors, nurses and other health professionals for the agency.
Nurses contribute at monthly team meetings conducted on each child.
These meetings include the social worker, psychiatrist, nurse, childcare worker and the teacher. Report sheets travel between school and residence with daily changes being reported back and forth. The residence is like the parent, and the parent has to know what has gone on with their child at school. School therapists, too, must maintain daily contact with the residences, says Bob Mayer, principal at the YCS-managed DHS Regional School, Middlesex campus. They can also provide ongoing therapy if needed when a child returns to his or her own home.