Effective Date: 5-1-19
The Critical Event Protocol is a process for reporting, reviewing, and documenting the Division’s response to significant events involving a child, such as child deaths, suicides or serious physical injury as well as other circumstances requiring a critical event response. The purpose of this process is to take a closer look at circumstances surrounding critical events, including the Children’s Division’s initial response to the critical event and prior involvement with the impacted family, with the goal of identifying systemic issues, agency practices, or areas of need which, if addressed through policy or practice, may improve the Division’s effectiveness moving forward.
All instances of a critical event should be reported to the hotline by CD staff as soon as possible. For more information on responses and procedures on critical events, see Section 2 of this manual.