Jail Diversion Instant Messaging (JDIM)

Customer: Joint Partnership of HarrisLOGIC, North Texas Behavior Authority (NorthSTAR Authority)ValueOptions, Dallas County Department of Criminal Justice

Organizational Profile

In the North Texas area, ValueOptions is a Behavioral Health Organization (BHO) that manages a behavioral health care provider network via contracts with the Texas Department of State Health Services (DSHS). ValueOptions works closely with the behavioral heath care service system in North Texas, known as NorthSTAR. NorthSTAR is an amalgamation of mental health and substance abuse providers serving eligible consumers in a 7-county county area . The counties served by NorthSTAR include Collin, Dallas, Ellis, Hunt, Kaufman, Navarro and Rockwall. Major providers in this network are referred to as Specialty Provider Networks (SPN).

The JDIM system was constructed as a public/private partnership between North Texas Behavioral Health Authority (NorthSTAR Authority), ValueOptions (BHO), Dallas County Department of Criminal Justice, and HarrisLOGIC.

Challenge

One of society's most difficult problems to solve involves people with mental illness who enter jails often as a result of not taking medications to control their illness. This problem becomes increasingly inhumane, expensive, and dangerous, as an individual's illnesses remain unidentified and untreated within the jail system. Many communities in the United States have efforts underway to divert nonviolent offenders with mental illness out of the jail system and back into the care of community based mental health care organizations. These diversion programs can be quite effective but require complex workflows and information sharing. Typically, jail diversion programs require days, weeks, or even months to accomplish a single diversion. Information must be shared by telephone, fax, or paper processes.

HarrisLogic set out to design a Jail Diversion Instant Messaging (JDIM) system, as a demonstration project, to support expedited jail diversion for nonviolent mentally ill offenders from county jail to community services. The challenge of the JDIM solution was to accomplish jail diversion within a few hours.

Solution

JDIM streamlines processes and connects people using real-time internet technology. Appling instant messaging, bot technologies, federated data models and workflow efficiencies, people and data interact across organizational boundaries.

The JDIM solution uses Internet chat technologies and online awareness to make access to people and data in real time affordable and efficient. This makes it possible for them to collaborate in new and interesting ways.

The JDIM solution employs "bots", which are programs that interact with people in an internet chat program. Bots act like people in the context of the workflow and provide simple actions based on each defined workflow. The bot knows who should have access to particular pieces of information and only provides actions appropriate to that person's role within the workflow. The data available to individuals in these workflows is provided on a "need to know" basis. Access rights are based on policies that define each role and the information necessary to fill that role. Data is housed or made available from a secure remote location with encryption of all messages to and from individuals in the workflow.

HarrisLOGIC uses a federated data model where information from existing government data warehouses is drawn to portray a holistic view of recent health care services provided for an individual. This is done without modifying the existing systems for collecting and maintaining that data. By clearly defining the source and authorities that provide data, access is controlled and applied to workflows between those entities while remaining HIPAA compliant. Clinical staff from multiple organizations is assigned specific roles, protected by a unique username and password to participate in this highly structured and secure workflow.

HarrisLOGIC has named the technology that made JDIM successful as "Workflow Without Boundaries."

Results and Benefits

The technologies that comprise the "Workflow Without Boundaries" are based on open standards that are widely available and supported. This approach ensures that implementations are not vendor specific and are economically maintained by public and private organizations.

Participation in these workflows is low impact and easily learned due to the unique and simple nature of the instant messaging workflow facilitation "Bots".

The JDIM solution provides an affordable and effective technical solution to jail diversion. Many programs across the country have been successful but none have been able to divert as quickly and efficiently as the program in the Dallas County Jail. JDIM facilitates this efficiency. JDIM's ease of use and simple design make diversion possible, along with the partnership of dedicated judges, court personnel, mental health authority personnel, managed care personnel, and community-based providers.

As important as it is to solve these kinds of problems it is perhaps more important that they are solved in ways that can be effectively maintained over time. By using open technologies and widely accepted technical standards, solutions such as JDIM are flexible and tolerant of change. HarrisLOGIC believes that good analysis, simple design, and the use of open technologies provide the best dynamics for public and private partnerships to solve society's most difficult problems.