Hospital Network Mission:

The Hospital Network (HN) believes that hospitals are in need of better connections to DCFS and the Los Angeles County child protection system. The HN has a particular focus on the reporting of suspected child abuse, specifically those under the age of four years, and increasing referrals to prevention services. We believe the reports that focus on young children provide a unique opportunity for prevention; and it is a goal of the HN to assist hospitals with increasing their overall reporting of suspected child abuse. Hospitals vary in their response to child maltreatment, and provide different levels of competence, and interest, in reporting child abuse. There exists little measure or quality assessment of their work, however its clear from the ICAN Child Death Review process that homicide by caretaker increases with younger age.

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History:

The HN project began with a statewide ICAN grant to write guidelines for investigation of fatal and severe child abuse. During the period of the initial grant, the Network worked with more than 100 hospitals statewide, in both urban and rural communities. More recently, the focus has shifted to primarily Los Angeles County, with a population just under 10 million, as a more manageable dataset. We still have the statewide goal of connecting hospitals with themselves, in terms of what their reporting looks like and how reports are managed, and with each other, for common data, sharable resources, and increased peer-to-peer interaction. The HNP is continuously challenged to balance the concerns of confidential records with the need to share information for the protection of children.