Author Archives: David T

HIPPY PVR – Recent Update

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A recent update has been made to the HIPPY personal visit record (PVR).

Literacy Activity Survey

A new section was added at the bottom of the PVR allowing home visitors to record Literacy Activity Survey entries from the PVR and have the entry added to the Child Health Info > Literacy Activity Survey section.

When selecting “Yes” or “No”, new fields will open up allowing you to indicate the number of days for each child listed on the PVR. If “Yes” is selected, the entry will default to 7 but can still be manually changed.

Not seeing this on the PVR?

The section needs to be turned on by the account administrator.

Go to Setup > Preferences

Open up the Personal Visit Records section and select “Yes” for “Literacy Activity Survey on PVR” and then save.

A new field for Format

When recording the curriculum delivered at the home visit, choose what format it was delivered in. Selections are “Paper copy”, “PDF copy” and “HIPPY 3.0”.

Let us know if you have any questions.

You asked… Immunizations on the Health Record

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This week, we released an update to the PAT Health Record. We received a question about making the immunizations update field stand out more. So we moved it to the top of the Health Review section.

Based on your selection, more fields will open up. Here’s some screenshots.

Default

If answering “No”:

If answering “Yes”:

Thank you for your continued input on making Visit Tracker more valuable for your work.

You asked… PVR Updates

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Here are some upcoming updates scheduled to be released this weekend based on requests we’ve received from you regarding the Personal Visit Record.

Literacy Survey

The Literacy Survey from the Child Health Info section will be added to the HIPPY and HFA Personal Visit Records.

To access this feature:

Turn it on in SETUP > PREFERENCES > PERSONAL VISIT RECORDS

On the Personal Visit Records, the Literacy Survey entries will be shown when answering the question “A family members read, told stories…”. The entries for each child will be added to the Literacy Survey section in each of their Health Info sections.

Safe Sleep Survey

Also being added to the PVR is the Safe Sleep Survey. This feature is available to the PAT and HFA programs and will show for children that are less than 1 year old.

Turn the feature on in SETUP > PREFERENCES > PERSONAL VISIT RECORDS the same as the Literacy Survey.

When turned on, Safe Sleep Survey entries will show for any child less than a year old on the PVR.

PVR Templates for Foundational Visits

We’ve set up PVR templates for the PAT programs based on each of the 8 Foundational visit plans. Templates 1501 – 1508 can be selected in the Planning Guides and/or PVRs to pre-populate the information related to the foundational visits.

PVR Data Export

A new export is available for PVR data. This export is available in the SERVICE REPORTS column.

Keep your suggestions coming! And let us know if you have any questions.

You asked… Recent updates

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Here are some of the suggestions/requests that have been released recently.

Kansas KIDS Exports

The KS KIDS exports were updated for the 2020-2021 program year

Family and Guardian Labels

  • The guardian’s email address was added to the Family Labels report
  • A family status filter was added to the Guardian Labels report. The request was to be able to include Waiting List families when running the Guardian Labels. The Status filter allows you to select any group of families by status.

Report – Screenings Review

The Display filter was updated to give you better options on which children you want to review.

APR – Section II. Service Delivery – Prenatal

It was brought to our attention that this section should report subsequent pregnancies not just at enrollment. This was updated.

Let us know if you need anything. Thanks!

New Feature: Data Quality Alerts

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Over the weekend, we released a brand new feature – Data Quality Alerts. Here’s an overview of what this feature is and how to start using these alerts.

Data Quality Alerts are a list of alerts that identify the missing data – enrollment data, update entries, assessments, screenings, etc – for the families and children you serve. The alerts are based on a start date you set through the current date. They alert you to the data needed for the current program year that hasn’t been entered yet.

There’s a list of items to choose from. Here’s how to get started.

First, Admins need to go to the SETUP > DATA QUALITY ALERTS section.

  • Set the start date. This is probably going to be your program start date. The alerts that are turned on will be based on the start date through the current date.
  • Turn on the alerts. Go through the list of alerts – grouped by Visit Tracker sections – and click “Show” for the alerts you want to be generated. When “Show” is checked, additional selections will be shown giving you some options for that alert.

Here are some screenshots of the Setup section.

The admins and home visitors will be able to view the Data Quality Alerts throughout Visit Tracker pages.

When first logging in, you’ll notice the Data Quality Alerts link in the upper left menu. You’ll be able to click on this link to view all Data Quality Alerts for all families and children in the program (Admins) or for the assigned caseload (Home Visitors). This link is in the upper left menu throughout the Family and Children sections as well.

The Data Quality Alerts page is generated when the first user logs in each day. The page let’s you know the date and time of the first login and expires after 24 hours. The notes at the top of the page provide some more details.

For all the alerts shown, the page will tell you how many alerts there are for each without having to open it up.

If you want to narrow down to a specific child or family, just start typing there name in the Search box.

Open up an alert to view the list.

When in the Family section

  • This family has a Data Quality Alert – This warning will be shown from the Family Home, Family, Guardian and Child Data pages if anyone in the family has an alert generated
  • Family DQ Alerts will be shown at the bottom of the family links. Click on this link to view the list of alerts for just that family.

When in the Child section

  • This family has a Data Quality Alert – The warning will show on the Child Data if the family has an alert.
  • Family DQ Alerts will be shown in the family links section for that child. Click on this link to view the list of alerts for just that family.

Hopefully this feature will help you easily stay on top of your data collection requirements and home visit preparation.

Exit and Inactive Status: Adding COVID-19 Information

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Over the weekend, we released a new feature where you can indicate if any exiting or inactive/on hold families are due to COVID-19. Here’s an overview of how it works.

First, Admins must turn it on in the Setup section. Preferences were added to both the Exit Reasons and Hold Reasons section. Select “Yes” to show the COVID-19 related indicator.

ILLINOIS PROGRAMS: These fields are already turned on in Preferences.

Now that it’s on, you’ll notice new fields when updating a family’s status to Exited or Inactive/On hold. Here, I’ll go over updating already Exited and Inactive/On hold families to indicate that it’s due to COVID.

Updating Exited and Inactive families

NOTE – This only applies to the family. The COVID-19 indicator does not show up for exited and inactive children.

In the Family section, go to Family Non-Actives or search for a specific family.

In Family Non-Actives, select Exited or Inactive / On Hold Families.

Choose a family to update by clicking on their name. In this example, I’m updating an exited family. But the same applies to inactive families as well.

You’ll land on the Family Data page. Scroll to the Family Enrollment – Status History table at the bottom. And click on the edit pencil for the latest Exited status.

NOTE: This table is also located on the Family Home page

Update the status. When clicking the “Related to COVID-19” checkbox, the “COVID-19 Notes” text field will appear. When unchecked, you won’t see the Notes field.

We’ve updated the Exit Summary report (located under Admin Reports in the Reports section) to include COVID information only if the fields are turned on in Preferences. These columns will show on both the Family and Child Exit Summary reports for both the HTML and CSV formats.

Let us know if you have any questions.

You asked… Recent release

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Here are some suggestions we’ve recently released and what’s coming soon.

GUARDIAN’S RELATIONSHIP TO THE CHILD

In the list of relationship options, “child” is no longer a selection item.

PAT programs will see “child” as a selection item on PAT’s form titled Family Intake Record. This may be due to differences in how individuals are entered in other data systems but it’s not necessary to have an item in Visit Tracker. So thank you for pointing that out!

PVR AUDIT TRAIL

An audit trail was added to the PVR in a past project but was only showing when viewing the printable version of the PVR. It was suggested that the audit trail should show on the editable version of the PVR as well. Here’s an example of what that looks like on the PVR.

CHILD SCREENINGS COMPLETED QUESTION

On each of the child screening records, the “…Screening Completed?” question is now required. When creating new records, the Yes/No selections will default to blank.

This suggestion came in due to this question often being overlooked resulting in screening compliance confusion.

UPCOMING SUGGESTIONS

Here are some of the items we have in our project schedule over the next few months.

  • PICCOLO – add a print version
  • PICCOLO – add individual scores to the report
  • Exit Summary report – add home visitor column
  • Updating exited families and children without having to reactivate

And one big suggestion that is currently in progress – Data Quality Alerts.

We often hear about the need to be alerted to missing data related to model compliance and MIECHV standards. There is the Reminders feature to help you know what is coming up. (Check out the Reminder Rules video if you haven’t already.) But that doesn’t cover the items that have been missed.

We’re working a menu of missing data alerts where your program can choose the items that are most important to you and help you with your everyday preparation in serving your families.

We’ll be sending out more details on this project as it gets closer to completion.

Keep the suggestions coming! Thank you

The Life of a Suggestion

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If you have submitted a help ticket any time within the last couple of years, you’ve noticed that you can specify that your help request is a “Suggestion”. This is one way in which we gather feedback on the needs for Visit Tracker. And these suggestions we get from you are critical in defining our projects and priorities. After all, you have a choice in the data system you use. And we’re honored that you continue to choose Visit Tracker.

With all the suggestions we get each week, I think it’s important to take a moment to go over the suggestion life cycle.

Submitting a suggestion

As stated above, one way to submit is through our Help Ticket system. Suggestions also come in through direct emails and phone calls. And sometimes, someone on the DataKeeper team makes a suggestion based on questions or complaints we’re receiving.

Reviewing a suggestion

As suggestions come in, we have a process where we review to determine if it’s something to be added into our projects list. Not every suggestion will make it into the project list.

  • Some suggestions are already in Visit Tracker. We’ll just offer “how to” support.
  • Some are not achievable. We’ll provide an explanation and offer support. Usually in this case, we’ve been talking to you about the suggestion to better understand the need and identify ways to solve the request.

Adding a suggestion into the project board

Once we’ve reviewed and decided the suggestion will become a project, we tag the ticket as a User Item, let you know that it’s being added into our project list, and submit the ticket as Open. This ends up adding the ticket into our project management system where it remains in our list of User Items to be scheduled.

If you have called in or emailed your suggestion, we will create an internal ticket and tag it so that it gets properly tracked through completion. This makes sure that we follow up with you once completed and released.

Scheduling a suggestion for development

We’ve got lots of great suggestions in our project list. Each quarter, we’re putting together a group of these suggestions for a release and/or adding individual User Items each month.

When a suggestion is scheduled for development, we update the ticket as Pending and send you a quick note so you are aware that it’s making progress.

Completing and releasing a suggestion

As each suggestion is completed and released, we complete the cycle with a thank you note. Your suggestion not only benefits you, but many others using Visit Tracker.

You’ll also notice the “You asked…” blog postings. Sometimes these will highlight 1 or 2 suggestions or be a summary of recent User Items released.

We greatly appreciate your continued feedback. The suggestion cycle is not always a quick turn around. So we equally appreciate your patience. Hopefully while your suggestion is waiting to be scheduled, you are still able to enjoy the other User Items that are being released.

Thanks!

Highlight: Reminder Rules

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You may already be familiar with Reminders that can be created for a family, child or in general. Reminders are available to set for all users. But Reminder Rules are automatic reminders that be set by the Main Admin under the Setup > Reminders section.

Reminder Rules can be created based on model compliance, funder requirements, etc. Here’s a few ideas:

  • Model Compliance – Initial and Annual assessments or screenings
  • MIECHV Developmental Screening schedule
  • Well child visit schedule

Here’s a brief video giving you an overview of how Reminder Rules might be helpful for your program.