Journal Article

Child welfare worker perspectives on documentation and case recording practices in Canada: A mixed-methods study protocol

Tonmyr, Lil, Yantha, Cassandra, Morton Ninomiya, Melody E., Pollock, Nathaniel J., Jewers-Dailley, Kimberly

2025

Overview

In health care and child welfare, clinical records and case notes serve multiple functions. When records are aggregated and processed to create administrative data, they can be analyzed and used to inform policy development and decision-making. To be useful, such data should be complete, accurate, and recorded in a standardized way. However, sources of bias and error can impact the quality of administrative data. During the development of national child welfare data in Canada, child welfare sector partners expressed concerns about the accuracy and completeness of data about children and families. This protocol describes a study that seeks to answer two questions: 1) What individual and institutional factors influence how client data is recorded by child welfare workers in Canada? 2) What data quality issues are created through documentation and case recording practices that may impact the use of clinical case management system data for public health statistics? In this protocol, we describe an exploratory mixed methods study that involves an online survey, interviews with a purposive sample of child welfare workers, and a document review of case recording guidelines. To be eligible for the study, participants must have worked at a child welfare agency or department with clinical documentation responsibilities as a part of their job. We will use descriptive statistics to analyze the survey data and thematic analysis to analyze the qualitative data. This study will help uncover strengths, limitations, and possible sources of bias created through case recording and documentation practices in child welfare. Study results will be shared through presentations to interest holders and will inform the further development of national child welfare data in Canada.

• Publisher: Public Library of Science,Public Library of Science (PLoS)
• Subject: Aggregate data / Archives & records / Beliefs, opinions and attitudes / Bias / Canada / Case management / Case management (Social services) / Child / Child development / Child Welfare / Child welfare workers / Children / Clinical decision making / Computer and Information Sciences / Data analysis / Data quality / Decision making / Development policy / Documentation / Documentation - standards / Economic development / Health care / Health services / Humans / Influence / Information systems / Inuit / Management / Medical records / Medicine and Health Sciences / Missing data / Mixed methods research / People and places / Policy making / Polls & surveys / Population / Public health / Public opinion / Qualitative analysis / Recording / Research and Analysis Methods / Social Sciences / Statistical analysis / Statistical methods / Statistics / Study Protocol / Surveys / Surveys and Questionnaires / Workers