Posted: 2/9/2016

Case Manager's Corner: February 2016

Barbara Hester | One Hope United

One of the most consistent and productive units in the entire system of care is supervised by Barbara Hester of One Hope United. Barbara, along with her teammates Ernestine Frazier, Sharon Mattison-Reid, and Ann Cruz have repeatedly surpassed their adoptions goals year after year. During the current fiscal year, they were able to meet their annual adoptions goal after only 4 months – amazing!! Barbara does all this in a very low-key and good-natured style that makes her one of the most respected and well-liked supervisors in the Heartland System of Care.

Sylvia Matteo | Children's Home Society

One of the highlights of the past quarter was the timely reunification of 9 siblings by Children's Home Society Supervisor Sylvia Matteo and her team. Not only did they reunify the children timely, but they were able to maintain the relative placement of those children during the entire time they were away from their mother and never had to separate them. It was a tremendous team effort that deserves a lot of recognition. Reunifying nine children is rare – reunifying all nine timely is almost unheard of.

Mary Thomas | GCJFCS

Gulf Coast Case Manager Mary Thomas is being recognized by her leadership team for her excellent work ethic, her extreme diligence and her high quality of documentation.

Cemico Green | Neighbor to Family

Neighbor to Family relayed this story of how Family Care Manager Cemico Green worked with one of her families:

Cemico Green, Family Care Manager at Neighbor to Family (NTF), worked with a teen (and family) who has Insulin Dependent Diabetes.  The teen was hospitalized several times due to diabetic ketoacidosis, due to a lack of parental supervision while the teen was supposed to be monitoring his glucose levels. The teen had been diagnosed with diabetes five years prior, and had been refusing to comply with his diabetic treatment and monitoring. The parents and grandparents trusted the teen to monitor sugar levels, but failed to regularly check the readings on the glucometer. Although the parents were warned by the Children’s Hospital that DCF would be contacted, they did not take action. The teen was hospitalized twice.

Ms. Green ensured that the family had information necessary to monitor the child’s daily sugar levels and food intake.  She created a daily log that worked for them to use for this purpose. She monitored it carefully and worked with the parents to submit it weekly to the Specialist for regular monitoring. She required them to submit copies to her weekly as well to ensure they were following through on the monitoring of the child. There were no further hospitalizations while NTF was involved. 

Over the course of NTF involvement, the parents demonstrated that they were able to follow through with the child’s medical appointments and monitor the teen’s daily sugar levels and food intake. Ms. Green empowered the parents (and teen) by demonstrating that they could manage this disease.  NTF is confident in the parents’ ability to oversee and maintain the child’s health and safety.

Be sure to view her Frontline Heroes video if you havent already!