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Protection Services (protection + services)
Kinds of Protection Services Selected AbstractsStructure and development of decision-support systems and their use by the State Plant Protection Services in Germany,EPPO BULLETIN, Issue 1 2000B. Kleinhenz To ensure continuing work on decision-support systems (DSSs) and the elaboration of new systems according to the needs of the Plant Protection Services of the federal states of Germany, these services have installed ZEPP (Central Institution for Decision Support Systems and Programmes in Crop Protection). At the national level, ZEPP guarantees a permanent supply of meteorological data, organizes and co-ordinates trials, incorporates scientific progress into the existing DSSs and, in close co-operation with universities and federal research stations, develops new systems for important pests. The PASO desktop system includes a data bank that administers all relevant meteorological files and field data. It allows for automated simulation runs and forecasts, serving as input for timely warnings by different media. Depending on the individual decision-support modules, results are presented as tables and/or graphs. [source] Healthcare Costs and Utilization of Vulnerable Elderly People Reported to Adult Protective Services for Self-NeglectJOURNAL OF AMERICAN GERIATRICS SOCIETY, Issue 4 2008(See editorial comments by Dr. Mark Lachs, pp 757) OBJECTIVES: To assess differences between diagnoses, healthcare utilization, and healthcare costs of vulnerable elderly people reported to Adult Protective Services for self-neglect and those of matched controls. DESIGN: A case-control study of 131 self-neglect cases and 131 matched controls. SETTING: All participants were patients in a public hospital geriatrics program. PARTICIPANTS: Adult Protection Services referred the self-neglect cases to an interdisciplinary geriatric medicine team. The controls were patients who used the same source of geriatric medical services and were matched on race or ethnicity, sex, and age. MEASUREMENTS: Diagnoses, healthcare utilization, and Medicare reimbursable costs were compared in cases and controls for 1 year before and 1 year after the case medical referral. RESULTS: Mental disorders were diagnosed more frequently in the self-neglect group than in the control group. Self-neglecters had lower healthcare utilization and medical costs than controls in the year before the medical referral, but utilization and costs were similar in the two groups in the year after the referral. CONCLUSION: This study provides evidence that, once self-neglecters are brought into the healthcare system, they are no more expensive than other similar patients. This result has important public policy implications and fills an important gap, because there is no published literature describing the financial effect of self-neglect on the healthcare system. [source] Sequential changes in hepatitis A virus genotype distribution in Estonia during 1994 to 2001JOURNAL OF MEDICAL VIROLOGY, Issue 2 2003Tatjana Tallo Abstract Hepatitis A virus (HAV) isolates from a large outbreak and from non-outbreak cases in Estonia were characterized by sequencing the aminoterminal VP1 region. From January 1998 to December 1999, a total of 1,084 cases of hepatitis A were reported to the Harjumaa-Tallinn and Ida-Virumaa Health Protection Services in Estonia. The attack rate was highest among males aged 15,29. Initial cases were noted to be associated with injecting drug use. IgM anti-HAV positive sera were available from 107 hospitalized outbreak cases and from 68 patients sampled during 1994 to 2001. HAV RNA was detected in 42% of sera from 1994,1996 and in 88% of sera from 1998,2001. It was possible to obtain HAV sequences from 83 outbreak and 29 background cases. The outbreak strain was represented by five different sequences, all belonging to subtype IIIA. During the outbreak, this IIIA strain also spread into the general population. All available non-outbreak isolates from 1994 to 2001 but one belonged to genotype IA and formed distinct clusters as compared to isolates from other parts of the world. One subtype IIIA isolate from 1995 was unrelated to the outbreak strain. Subtype IA had been dominating in Estonia during 1994,2001, but the outbreak strain from 1998 to 1999 was IIIA. This subtype was encountered previously in addicts in Sweden during the 1980s and in Norway at the end of the 1990s. This study supports the use of limited sequencing within the aminoterminal VP1 region for studying the molecular epidemiology of hepatitis A. J. Med. Virol. 70: 187,193, 2003. © 2003 Wiley-Liss, Inc. [source] Early case conferences shorten length of stay in children admitted to hospital with suspected child abuseJOURNAL OF PAEDIATRICS AND CHILD HEALTH, Issue 9-10 2005J Anne S Smith Objective: To compare the outcomes of two models for the management of children admitted to hospital with suspected child abuse: routine early case conferencing versus standard evaluation. Methods: Between March 2001 and February 2002 professionals from the Royal Children's Hospital, Melbourne, Victoria Police and Child Protection services collaborated on a randomized controlled study involving children admitted to hospital with suspected child abuse. The intervention group (n = 13) received a case conference within 24 h of the child's admission to hospital. The control group (n = 12) were managed according to standard procedures whereby each organization conducted their own evaluation (and a case conference might or might not have been held). Patients were followed for 3 months with data collected from all three professional groups. Results: The process of evaluation, the eventual diagnosis of child abuse and the confidence with which professionals made this diagnosis was not significantly different between the groups. Case conferences were judged to be useful regardless of their timing. Mean length of stay in the intervention group was significantly less than in controls (42.4 h vs 99.7 h, P = 0.01). Conclusion: Early case conferences appear to shorten the period of time children spend in hospital when child abuse is suspected. This has significant implications for reducing costs for all organizations involved in the evaluation of suspected child abuse. [source] Structure and organization of warning services in Rheinland-Pfalz (Germany),EPPO BULLETIN, Issue 1 2000E. Jörg Rheinland-Pfalz, a federal state in the south-western part of Germany, is an agricultural region with high crop diversity. For each branch of agriculture (arable, fruits, vegetables and ornamental plants), specific warning and information services have been installed. Advisory work, including warning services, is done by a central (LPP) and eight regional state institutions (SL V As). LPP provides the infrastructure for information dissemination, organizes data acquisition and supplies the farmers with general information on crop protection (availability of plant protection products, control strategies, etc.), SL V As collect data on current pest development and elaborate regional recommendations on field assessments and control measures to be taken by the farmers. Warning service information is transmitted to the farmers by info post (periodic letters), telephone-answering machines, fax services and, lately, via the Internet. Farmers are mainly interested in current disease and pest severity data, preferably on a local basis, to aid their decision-making in crop protection. The forecasting models and computer-aided decision-support systems run by the state crop protection service have become essential tools during the last four years. Their results, supplemented by field-monitoring data, serve as the main input for the warning services. The Internet, in conjunction with computerized decision-support systems, provides the means of ensuring an adequate supply of warning service information at a time when crop protection services are undergoing severe staff reductions. [source] The Failure of Organizational Learning from Crisis , A Matter of Life and Death?JOURNAL OF CONTINGENCIES AND CRISIS MANAGEMENT, Issue 3 2009Dominic Elliott The continuing failure of organizations to learn from crisis has many costs, social, political, financial and individual and may be attributable to a misunderstanding of learning processes. This paper maps out contributions to learning from crisis from a number of fields. Central to the paper's argument is that the separation of policy development from practice, in theory and action, has contributed to a failure to learn. The paper considers two cases where the failure of child protection services resulted in the deaths of the children concerned. These two cases, separated by seven years, were connected by the failure of the same local authorities and agencies. The paper concludes with a number of observations concerning the public inquiry process. [source] Making Child Protection Policy: The Crime and Misconduct Commission Inquiry into Abuse of Children in Foster Care in QueenslandAUSTRALIAN JOURNAL OF PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION, Issue 3 2008Clare Tilbury Internationally as well as in Australia, public inquiries have become one of the dominant means of scrutinising child protection services. As such, inquiries have become a policy mechanism for defining the problem of child abuse, and developing possible solutions. This article examines the 2004 Crime and Misconduct Commission Inquiry into the Abuse of Children in Foster Care in Queensland. It discusses both the problems and potential of public inquiries in promoting positive change in a contested policy field like child protection. [source] Stepfather involvement in social interventions made by youth protection services in stepfamiliesCHILD & FAMILY SOCIAL WORK, Issue 3 2007Claudine Parent ABSTRACT Despite efforts made by management and caseworkers to promote active parental participation in the protective context, fathers or other male figures are often brushed aside from intervention. This paper presents the results of qualitative research on methods used by youth protection caseworkers (n = 22) working with stepfather families. The main objective is to identify items that encourage or discourage stepfather involvement in psychosocial interventions. Results showed that certain items do not apply solely to stepfathers, but influence youth protection caseworker decision-making from a broader perspective. Particular characteristics associated with being a stepfather significantly influence involvement practices espoused by caseworkers, notably the absence of legal status and biological connection with the mother's children. [source] ,Violent' deaths of children in England and Wales and the major developed countries 1974,2002: possible evidence of improving child protection?CHILD ABUSE REVIEW, Issue 5 2008Colin Pritchard Abstract Child protection services are criticised for failing to prevent abuse but demonstrating successful prevention is impossible as it is trying to prove a ,negative'. The alternative is to examine ,failures', i.e. the ,violent' deaths of children (0,14 years) to indicate whether matters are improving or deteriorating. This paper uses the latest World Health Organisation data to compare children's ,violent' deaths in England and Wales with those in other major developed countries. To account for possible ,hidden' under-reported abuse deaths, undetermined, i.e. ,other external causes of death' (OECD) and fatal accidents and adverse events (AAE), deaths are also analysed along with homicides, to compare all ,violence-related' deaths between 1974,76 and 2000,02. England and Wales infant (<1 year) homicide rates were annually 57 per million but fell to 17 per million, a 74% fall. Infant AAE deaths fell in every country with England and Wales falling from 341 per million to 71 per million, a 76% reduction. Both these results were significantly better than those of eight other major developed countries, although England and Wales infant OECD at 26 per million, were high compared to the major developed countries. In the 1970s, combined ,violent' deaths of all children (0,14 years) (homicide, OECD and AAE) in England and Wales were 203 per million, they are now 61 per million, a 70% decline with only Italy having lower rates. The worst rates were in the USA which had the highest combined ,violent' death rate. These overall results in the major reductions of ,violence-related' deaths in England and Wales can be a boost to the morale of front-line staff and provide the public with an indication of the progress being made. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] The preoccupation with thresholds in cases of child death or serious injury through abuse and neglectCHILD ABUSE REVIEW, Issue 5 2008Marian Brandon Abstract Thresholds into and between services emerged as a significant theme in the biennial analysis of cases of child death and serious injury through abuse and neglect ,serious case reviews' carried out in England for the (then) Department for Education and Skills between 2003,05. The preoccupation with thresholds was one of a number of interacting risk factors and many children's cases were on the boundary of services and levels of intervention. In most cases child protection did not come ,labelled as such' which reinforces the need for all practitioners, including those working with adults to be alert to the risks of significant harm. Policy makers should acknowledge that staff working in early intervention are working within the safeguarding continuum and not in a separate sphere of activity. The emotional impact of working with hostility from violent parents and working with resistance from older adolescents impeded engagement, judgement and safeguarding action. In the long term neglect cases that were reviewed, the threshold for formal child protection services was rarely met and some agencies and practitioners coped with feelings of helplessness by adopting the ,start again syndrome'. Adequate resources are essential but not sufficient to redress the problems. Effective and accessible supervision is crucial to help staff to put into practice the critical thinking required to understand cases holistically, complete analytical assessments, and weigh up interacting risk and protective factors. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] The role of service delivery non governmental organisations in policy reformCHILD ABUSE REVIEW, Issue 6 2007Judith Harwin Abstract This article considers the role of non-governmental organisations (NGOs) in supporting the development of policy to enhance child welfare and protection services. It examines some of the opportunities and barriers which exist for small-scale service,delivery organisations to contribute effectively to policy formulation and explores opportunities for the development of this capacity. The discussion is illustrated by specific reference to the role of the NGOs in southeastern Europe, the Former Soviet Union and Central Asia. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] Helping parents, protecting children: ideas from GermanyCHILDREN & SOCIETY, Issue 5 2000Karen Baistow This paper focuses on the help-seeking process in the field of child welfare and, with a view to identifying some of the key conditions which facilitate the process, it examines the ways in which the German system responds to parental requests for help. It is based on recent comparative studies between English users of child welfare and protection services and a similar group in Germany and on discussions with German and English social workers. It is suggested we can usefully learn from the preventative services available in Germany under the Children and Young Persons Help Act (1990) which make both help seeking and help giving more straightforward. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. 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