A Department of Social Work uses data to prove its case [corrected].

The introductions of managed care with its emphasis on cost containment has led a Department of Social Work Services at a large urban teaching center to better document and justify its roles. A concrete result was the saving of social work positions during budget cutbacks and downsizing. There is also information in these data to help clarify the differential roles of social workers and utilization review nurses in the hospital case management/discharge planning processes. The system came about because of concerns around cost containment, the need for more systematic discharge planning and the advent of the Prospective Payment System and Diagnosis Related Groups (DRG's) as a means of reimbursement to hospitals.

Computer-assisted tracking of a case management program for the homeless.

Computer scan sheet technology was used to evaluate process and outcome variables in a case management shelter program for the homeless. Clients spent up to four months in this program, working on a number of goal areas, including housing, employment, drugs and alcohol, mental and physical health, and literacy. Using Tele-Form, a computer program that allows scan sheets to be designed on screen, case manager recording forms were developed that allowed interventions to be documented on a daily basis, while psychosocial goal areas were documented on scan sheets at intake and termination. Data from these scan sheets were fed into SPSS, a statistical program for the social sciences. Using the case management tracking guidelines developed by Frankel and LaPorte, 1998, the results of this study showed that scan sheet technology was an effective, efficient, and extremely cost-effective way to track case management. The analysis of the data and subsequent discussion suggested ways about how to make case management evaluation more uniform across the country.

Tracking case management accountability: a systems approach.

A review of the evaluation of case management programs in the last two decades reveals a lack of consistency in showing outcome effectiveness. In addition, program evaluation models do not reflect the most prevalent theoretical foundation of case management practice, systems theory. It was the purpose of this article to conceptually establish an evaluation model that reflects systems theory in case management practice, to develop evaluation instruments congruent to collecting data in this model, and then to field-test this evaluation model.