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Home My WebLink AboutEI Provider Meeting Minutes 10-16-24 Early Intervention Provider Meeting Wednesday, October 16, 2024 3³ ¥¥ 0±¤²¤³: Jenn Hawbecker, Zachary Gantz, Angela Alleman, Stacey Brookens 0±®µ¨£¤±² 0±¤²¤³Ȁ (¤ «³§0±® 0¤£¨ ³±¨¢² - Cynthia Bosserman & Theresa Miller 0¤£¨ ³±¨¢ 4§¤± ¯¸ 3¯¤¢¨ «¨²³² - Riley Lauffer & Krista Miracle -®µ¨¦ -®´³ ¨² 0¤£¨ ³±¨¢ 4§¤± ¯¸ Lauren Everetts 3¤±µ¨¢¤ !¢¢¤²² ǉ - ¦¤¬¤³ Holly Whiteside )µ® (¤ «³§# ±¤ - Joanne LaSalle 5#0 ®¥ #¤³± « 0! Caroline Dille !* 4§¤± ¯¸ Services Jennifer Davis PennCares 3´¯¯®±³ 3¤±µ¨¢¤² - Airica Evangelista-Simmers -%%4).' -).54%3 7¤«¢®¬¤ £ )³±®£´¢³¨®² This meeting was held in virtual format. All providers introduced themselves and their agency affiliations. 0±®µ¨£¤± 5¯£ ³¤² £ !®´¢¤¬¤³² (¤ «³§0±® 0¤£¨ ³±¨¢² #¸³§¨ "®²²¤±¬ HealthPro continues to try to hire additional staff. They are looking for speech- language pathologists (SLPs) and occupational therapists (OTs). !* 4§¤± ¯¸ 3¤±µ¨¢¤² *¤¨¥¤± $ µ¨² AJ Therapy Services has openings for speech therapy. 0¤£¨ ³±¨¢ 4§¤± ¯¸ 3¯¤¢¨ «¨²³² 2¨«¤¸ , ´¥¥¤± & +±¨²³ -¨± ¢«¤ Pediatric Therapy Specialists (PTS) has hired a new special instructor (SI), Karla Strait. Karla is experienced in working with the hearing impaired. They continue to look for physical therapists (PTs) and SLPs. )µ® (¤ «³§# ±¤ - *® ¤ , 3 ««¤ Invo has hired an SLP. They still have OT opportunities open. 0¤# ±¤² 3´¯¯®±³ 3¤±µ¨¢¤² - !¨±¨¢ %µ ¦¤«¨²³ -Simmers PennCares hired an SLP. She is finishing her job shadowing and will start taking clients soon. They are also looking to hire a PT and OT. 3¤±µ¨¢¤ !¢¢¤²² ǉ - ¦¤¬¤³ (®««¸ 7§¨³¤²¨£¤ Service Access and Management (SAM) no longer has a bilingual Service Coordinator (SC). They are advertising for either a full or part-time position or somebody that is bilingual. They have had four (4) applicants. None of those applicants qualified due to not having the required college credits needed for the Early Intervention Provider Meeting Wednesday, October 16, 2024 position. SAM had twenty-seven (27) referrals in the first few days of the month and twelve (12) of them were non-English-speaking families. They are currently using a language line to assist in communication with these families. Currently, SAM has four (4) full-time employees and two (2) part-time. They are looking to hire at least one (1) more full-time person, preferably bilingual. -®µ¨¦ -®´³ ¨² , ´±¤ %µ¤±¤³³² Moving Mountains has hired an SLP. She is finishing her training at this time so it will be a little while until she is ready to take on a caseload. % ±«¸ )³¤±µ¤³¨® 3¯¤¢¨ «¨²³² Ȩ%)3ȩ As of October 1, 2024, Early Intervention Specialists (EIS) is a new EI contracted provider. They originated in the Pittsburg area. They currently serve multiple counties in the central region. They have an SI who lives in the Fayetteville area who will serve Franklin/Fulton Counties. &¨²¢ « 5¯£ ³¤² 2024-2025 #®³± ¢³² Fiscal Year 2023-2024 allocations were used to set up the contracts for FY24-25. There were not enough funds in FY23-24 to cover all of our expenses. Zach will be submitting an additional funding request to true-up FY23-24. The state will issue a re-budget. We should then get an increase for the FY24-25 allocations. "¨««¨¦ 2¤¬¨£¤±² th Reminder: please be sure you are consistently billing by the 15 of each month. Please be sure to email both Zach and Jenn when you have voids or adjustments with billing. If anyone has any questions, please reach out to Zach and Jenn. 3¤±µ¨¢¤ $¤«¨µ¤±¸Ȁ #® ¢§¨¦ !¢±®²² 3¤³³¨¦² 5¯£ ³¤ 0! % ±«¸ )³¤±µ¤³¨® #® ¢§ %£®±²¤¬¤³ Congratulations to Elizabeth Willson, Occupational Therapist with Pediatric Therapy Specialists of South Central PA. She has completed the necessary requirements and has received her endorsement. 4± ¢ª¨¦ 3¯±¤ £²§¤¤³ %£ ®¥ 9¤ ± $ ³ The EI Service Delivery Learning Path tracking sheet and outcomes are due by January 31, 2025. 0±®µ¨£¤± 2¤¦¨²³±¸ 2¤²®´±¢¤² Early Intervention Provider Meeting Wednesday, October 16, 2024 Provider Registry resources and guides are available on the Early Intervention Technical Assistance (EITA) portal. You can access this page by clicking the link - https://www.eita-pa.org/resources/. Reminders Please have staff enter training certificates throughout the year. Make sure licenses, clearances, and certificates are uploaded in all of the correct areas. Please make sure you're sending new hire information to Jenn prior to a new staff person starting so that she can verify that they are qualified for the position. Also, please be sure to enter them into the provider registry. %)4! 0®±³ « !¢³ ΓΗ #§ ¦¤² Within the EITA portal there are trainings that providers can self-enroll to include ones st that are Act 48 related. This is effective July 1. The pre-registration courses are open for three (3) months at a time. Users can complete the courses at any point during the quarter. When a provider completes a pre-registration training on the EITA portal, they will get their presentation certificate immediately and their Act 48 credit at the end of the quarter. At the last provider meeting, we talked about the EI Service delivery course being embedded into the EI orientation course. Jenn reached out to one of the EITA consultants, Melissa in order to complete the Early Intervention Service Delivery in PA you must finish the course then download and save your certificate. If you have already completed this course within the past year, you do not need to take it again; just download and save your certificate then upload it. Those who complete the orientation would have the overall orientation certificate as well as the certificate for the service delivery course. Interpretation 0±®¢¤£´±¤ to meet with Sila Alegret-Bartel with Intentional Corporate Training and Marketing (ICTM) to get some written procedures in place. Please be patient with the service coordinators as we are working through this process. As of now, the service coordinators will let ICTM know that they have picked up a new child and who is going to be the ongoing provider. There is a referral form that can be submitted to ICTM. We are going to continue with how things are being handled for now, if any changes happen once she meets with ICTM, Jenn will update everybody of any new processes and procedures. Early Intervention Provider Meeting Wednesday, October 16, 2024 #®¥¨±¬¨¦ 6¨²¨³² There's been some confusion, especially with initial visits, with EI providers thinking that ICTM is going to confirm visits for them. That is not the case. If one of your staff members need a visit confirmed and they're not able to communicate with the parent via text message or phone, please communicate with ICTM at schedule@ictmllc.com or the interpreter to reach out to the family. The EI provider is the organizer of the visit, they need to make sure they're not assuming that ICTM or the interpreter are going to confirm that visit with the family. Communication There have been some communication issues between the providers and ICTM. Jenn will request that if ICTM gets notification of a cancellation, they will reach out to the provider. Jenn is also asking the providers to make sure with ICTM through their email address, as well as the interpreter with any notifications that they receive. As of right now, the best way to communicate with ICTM is through their email address. If the provider has a cell number for the interpreter, that can also be used as long as they also email ICTM. A question was asked as to whether or not the providers can have access to the Jenn will get clarification on communication issues when she meets with ICTM. 2¤¬¨£¤±Ȁ 3´¡¬¨²²¨® ®¥ 3¤²²¨® .®³¤² £ -¨²²¤£ 3¤²²¨®² Please continue to provide the session notes and missed session information to Jenn. The missed session information helps when it comes to billing. A question was asked when we have an evaluation and develop an Individualized Family Service Plan (IFSP), and the family selects a provider, do we have to fill out the form and send it to ICTM letting them know this is the agency chosen and the therapist? Also, do providers need to submit an additional form if another therapy is added? Jenn replied that the form should only be filled out once and that she will also get clarification on that when she meets with ICTM. A question was asked of the other providers, when working with a family, and you schedule an ongoing session, do you fill out another form, or do they take care of all that on their end? A response was given that once we have our interpreter, we schedule the next session with the interpreter. The interpreter then communicates with the scheduler and then we sign a verification form that the sessions have happened. Jenn responded that her thoughts would be that when the SCs are trying to schedule monitorings or home visits it is handled through the provider. A question was asked in regards to phone calls. If we email the agency and ask them to remind the family that we have an appointment, is that a charge to the county? Early Intervention Provider Meeting Wednesday, October 16, 2024 Jenn responded that in the past ICTM has not charged to reach out to a family in regards to ongoing services. It was suggested that agencies could use Google Translate to send appointment reminder texts to the families. Jenn stated that even though it is expensive, we have to communicate with the families in their native language and that she will continue to look for solutions to the translation issues. 0-/3 2¤¬¨£¤±² As a reminder in order for sessions to count as one (1) unit, they have to be exactly fifteen (15) minutes. If the session is twenty (20) minutes, it only counts as one (1) unit. Please remind staff to make sure they are accurately counting the number of units for each session. Please make sure therapists and SCs are entering the home together for monitorings. New strategies and what to work on conversations should be occurring with the family at each session. That information can be used to fill out the form. The SCs rely on that information from the therapist to add to the IFSP. Please make sure that all of the sections for the Progress Monitoring report are completed. !££¨³¨® « 5¯£ ³¤² %) 0±®µ¨£¤± 2®²³¤± 5¯£ ³¤ Please send Jenn any updates to the EI roster. 0±®µ¨£¤± 2¤¯®±³² due 0±¨®± ³® ³§¤ .¤·³ -¤¤³¨¦ st Audited Financial Report (for fiscal year ending 6/30) De¢¤¬¡¤± Βΐ th Audit Engagement/Extension Letter for calendar year ending 12/31 J ´ ±¸ ΐΏ Progress Report on Outcomes in Appendix A (not required for contracts with an st encumbrance under $50,000) J ´ ±¸ Βΐ th Monthly Billing £´¤ ΐΔ ®¥ ¤ ¢§ month th Employee Debarment and Exclusion Check £´¤ ΐΔ ®¥ ¤ ¢§ ¬®³§ 2¤¬¨£¤±² ®¥ ³§¤²¤ ±¤¯®±³² ±¤ ²¤³ ®´³ Ζ-Η ¶¤¤ª² ¯±¨®± ³® ³§¤¨± £´¤ £ ³¤ȁ 9®´ ¢ «²® ±¤µ¨¤¶ ³§¤ ±¤¯®±³²ȝ£´¤ £ ³¤² ¨ ¯±®¢¤£´±¤ ²³ ³¤¬¤³ -()$%)-ΗΔΙ #®³± ¢³ 2¤°´¨±¤£ 2¤¯®±³² £ $´¤ Dates. .¤·³ -¤¤³¨¦Ȁ 7¤£¤²£ ¸Ǿ * ´ ±¸ ΐΔǾ ΑΏΑ5 starting at 10:00 a.m. thththth ΑΏΑΔ -¤¤³¨¦ D ³¤²Ȁ * ´ ±¸ ΐΔǾ !¯±¨« ΐΕǾ *´«¸ ΐΕǾ £ /¢³®¡¤± ΐΔ Minutes by Angela Alleman