Iowa Administrative Code › Agency 441 - Human Services Department › Title XV - Individual and Family Support and Protective Services › Chapter 175 - Abuse of Children › Rule 441-175.21 - Definitions

Current through Register Vol. 47, No. 3, July 24, 2024
"Adequate food, shelter, clothing, medical or mental
				  health treatment, supervision or other care"
means that food, shelter,
				  clothing, medical or mental health treatment, supervision or other care which,
				  if not provided, would constitute a denial of critical care.
"Allegation"
means a statement setting forth
				  a condition or circumstance yet to be proven.
"Assessment"
means the process by which the
				  department responds to all accepted reports of alleged child abuse. An
				  "assessment" addresses child safety, family functioning, culturally competent
				  practice, and identifies the family strengths and needs, and engages the family
				  in services if needed. The department's assessment process occurs either
				  through a child abuse assessment or a family assessment.
"Assessment intake"
means the process by
				  which the department receives and records a report of suspected child
				  abuse.
"Caretaker"
means a person responsible for
				  the care of a child as defined in Iowa Code section
				  232.68.
"Case"
means a report of suspected child
				  abuse that has been accepted for assessment services.
"Child abuse assessment"
means an assessment
				  process by which the department responds to all accepted reports of child abuse
				  which allege child abuse as defined in Iowa Code section
				  232.68(2)
"a"
(1) through (3) and (5) through (11) as amended by 2016
				  Iowa Acts, Senate File 2258; or which allege child abuse as defined in Iowa
				  Code section
				  232.68(2)
"a"
(4) that also allege imminent danger, death, or injury to a
				  child. A "child abuse assessment" results in a disposition and a determination
				  of whether a case meets the definition of child abuse and a determination of
				  whether criteria for placement on the registry are met.
"Denial of critical care"
means the failure
				  on the part of a person responsible for the care of a child to provide for the
				  adequate food, shelter, clothing, medical or mental health treatment,
				  supervision or other care necessary for the child's health and welfare when
				  financially able to do so, or when offered financial or other reasonable means
				  to do so, and shall mean any of the following:
1. Failure to provide adequate food and nutrition to the
				  extent that there is danger of the child suffering injury or death.
2. Failure to provide adequate shelter to the extent that
				  there is danger of the child suffering injury or death.
3. Failure to provide adequate clothing to the extent that
				  there is danger of the child suffering injury or death.
4. Failure to provide adequate health care to the extent that
				  there is danger of the child suffering injury or death. A parent or guardian
				  legitimately practicing religious beliefs who does not provide specified
				  medical treatment for a child for that reason alone shall not be considered
				  abusing the child and shall not be placed on the child abuse registry. However,
				  a court may order that medical service be provided where the child's health
				  requires it.
5. Failure to provide the mental health care necessary to
				  adequately treat an observable and substantial impairment in the child's
				  ability to function.
6. Gross failure to meet the emotional needs of the child
				  necessary for normal development.
7. Failure to provide for the adequate supervision of the
				  child that a reasonable and prudent person would provide under similar facts
				  and circumstances when the failure results in direct harm or creates a risk of
				  harm to the child.
8. Failure to respond to the infant's life-threatening
				  conditions (also known as withholding medically indicated treatment) by
				  providing treatment (including appropriate nutrition, hydration and medication)
				  which in the treating physician's reasonable medical judgment will be most
				  likely to be effective in ameliorating or correcting all conditions, except
				  that the term does not include the failure to provide treatment (other than
				  appropriate nutrition, hydration, or medication) to an infant when, in the
				  treating physician's reasonable medical judgment any of the following
				  circumstances apply: the infant is chronically and irreversibly comatose; the
				  provision of the treatment would merely prolong dying, not be effective in
				  ameliorating or correcting all of the infant's life-threatening conditions, or
				  otherwise be futile in terms of the survival of the infant; the provision of
				  the treatment would be virtually futile in terms of the survival of the infant
				  and the treatment itself under the circumstances would be inhumane.
"Department"
means the Iowa department of
				  human services and includes the local offices of the department.
"Differential response"
means an assessment
				  system in which there are two discrete pathways to respond to accepted reports
				  of child abuse, a child abuse assessment and a family assessment. The child
				  abuse assessment pathway shall require a determination of abuse and a
				  determination of whether criteria for placement on the central abuse registry
				  are met.
"Facility providing care to a child"
means
				  any public or private facility, including an institution, hospital, health care
				  facility, intermediate care facility for persons with an intellectual
				  disability, residential care facility for persons with an intellectual
				  disability, or skilled nursing facility, group home, mental health facility,
				  residential treatment facility, shelter care facility, detention facility, or
				  child care facility which includes licensed day care centers, all registered
				  family and group day care homes and licensed family foster homes. A public or
				  private school is not a facility providing care to a child, unless it provides
				  overnight care. Public facilities which are operated by the department of human
				  services are assessed by the department of inspections and appeals.
"Family assessment"
means an assessment
				  process by which the department responds to all accepted reports of child abuse
				  which allege child abuse as defined in Iowa Code section
				  232.68(2)
"a"
(4), but do not allege imminent danger, death, or injury to
				  a child. A "family assessment" does not include a determination of whether a
				  case meets the definition of child abuse and does not include a determination
				  of whether criteria for placement on the central abuse registry are met.
"Home"
means a permanent or temporary
				  structure where one resides, including a licensed foster family home. For the
				  purpose of this chapter, "home" shall not be construed to include any public or
				  private facility, such as an institution, hospital, health care facility,
				  intermediate care facility for persons with an intellectual disability,
				  residential care facility for persons with an intellectual disability, skilled
				  nursing facility, group care, mental health facility, residential treatment
				  facility, shelter care facility, detention facility, licensed day care center,
				  or child foster care provided by an agency.
"Illegal drug"
means cocaine, heroin,
				  amphetamine, methamphetamine or other illegal drugs, including marijuana, or
				  combinations or derivatives of illegal drugs which were not prescribed by a
				  health practitioner
"Immediate threat"
or
"imminent
				  danger"
means conditions which, if no response were made, would be
				  more likely than not to result in sexual abuse, injury or death to a
				  child.
"Infant,"
as used in the definition of
				  "denial of critical care," numbered paragraph "8," means an infant less than
				  one year of age or an infant older than one year of age who has been
				  hospitalized continuously since birth, who was born extremely prematurely, or
				  who has a long-term disability.
"Nonaccidental physical injury"
means an
				  injury which was the natural and probable result of a caretaker's actions which
				  the caretaker could have reasonably foreseen, or which a reasonable person
				  could have foreseen in similar circumstances, or which resulted from an act
				  administered for the specific purpose of causing an injury.
"Physical injury"
means damage to any bodily
				  tissue to the extent that the tissue must undergo a healing process in order to
				  be restored to a sound and healthy condition or damage to any bodily tissue
				  which results in the death of the person who has sustained the damage.
"Preponderance of evidence"
means evidence
				  which is of greater weight or more convincing than the evidence which is
				  offered in opposition to it.
"Proper supervision"
means that supervision
				  which a reasonable and prudent person would exercise under similar facts and
				  circumstances, but in no event shall the person place a child in a situation
				  that may endanger the child's life or health, or cruelly or unduly confine the
				  child. Dangerous operation of a motor vehicle is a failure to provide proper
				  supervision when the person responsible for the care of a child is driving
				  recklessly, or driving while intoxicated with the child in the motor vehicle.
				  The failure to restrain a child in a motor vehicle does not, by itself,
				  constitute a cause to assess a child abuse report.
"Rejected intake"
means a report of
				  suspected child abuse that has not been accepted for assessment.
"Reporter"
means the person making a verbal
				  or written statement to the department, alleging child abuse.
"Report of suspected child abuse"
means a
				  verbal or written statement made to the department by a person who suspects
				  that child abuse has occurred.
"Reside"
or
"resides"
means
				  to habitually sleep or live. A person's subjective intent as to where the
				  person resides is not relevant.
"Sex trafficking"
means the recruitment,
				  harboring, transportation, provision, obtaining, patronizing, or soliciting of
				  a person for the purpose of commercial sexual activity as defined in Iowa Code
				  section
				  710A.1.
"Sex trafficking victim"
means a victim of
				  sex trafficking.
"Subject of a report of child abuse"
means
				  any of the following:
1. A child named in a report as having been abused, or the
				  child's attorney or guardian ad litem.
2. A parent or the attorney for the parent of a child named
				  in a child abuse assessment summary as having been abused.
3. A guardian or legal custodian, or that person's attorney,
				  of a child named in a child abuse assessment summary as having been
				  abused.
4. A person or the attorney for the person named in a child
				  abuse assessment summary as having abused a child.
"Unduly"
shall mean improper or unjust, or
				  excessive.