DCF Deserves Some Federal Intervention

DCF deserves some federal intervention
In a recent report on Florida’s Department of Children and Families, the Miami Herald found that DCF had hidden 30 child deaths since last October or November. These deaths, in addition to the 477 already documented in the last few years, warrant national attention.
Regretfully, Florida DCF is into its third secretary in the last three years.
My wife and I spent almost five years in Florida as house parents of two different licensed foster children institutions. It was the spirit of “not in the best interest of the child” by DCF and its subcontractors that drove us away. We were not “team players.”

In the last year, I sent many letters to the Health and Human Services secretary about my Florida child welfare history, but their “protocol” quickly directed me back to Tallahassee. Isn’t it past time for a federal intervention? But, then they can’t get our Veteran’s Administration right.

MIKE SAWYER

i@amblessed.com

http://www.tallahassee.com/story/opinion/readers/2014/06/08/sunday-letters/10100923/

DCF-Child-Deaths-Transparency

TALLAHASSEE, Florida — Child-welfare officials said Monday that they are creating a new position within the agency in an effort to improve transparency when releasing child-abuse-death records.

The Department of Children and Families has been under intense scrutiny after a series by The Miami Herald highlighted the deaths of 477 children in the past five years. The newspaper accused the agency of recently shifting its internal policies regarding the sharing of information about child deaths in a way that left the records they released so heavily redacted they were nearly useless.
The details surrounding a child's death are typically public, although names of surviving siblings are confidential.
The person who assumes the new role will oversee data gathering and the agency's responses to child deaths, the officials said.
"When tragedies occur, especially those involving children, our response must be consistent, coordinated, compassionate and transparent," new interim secretary Mike Carroll wrote in a memo Monday to regional managers and the news media.

Tricky Ricky

Gov. Rick Scott appointed Carroll last week. Carroll said he hopes to fill the new position within a month, and he added that the new hire must be given the authority to make policy changes as needed.
Carroll also asked regional managers to finalize plans to streamline reporting so that leaders are immediately informed after a child's death and that information in the reports is consistent and accurate. The Herald series noted serious lag times in reporting child deaths in some cases.
Florida lawmakers also want more accountability from the agency. The Legislature passed a bipartisan bill last week requiring DCF to post child-death information on its website, including the date, region, cause of death, what private contractors were involved and the age of the child. Many of the children identified in the newspaper series were under the age of 5.

http://www.tribtown.com/view/story/cf306db4991f45a29a007602d951f1ec/FL--DCF-Child-Deaths-Transparency

Dr. Sohail Punjwani Over Medicating Children In DCF Florida Foster Care Leads To Deaths

South Florida Family Sues Dr. Sohail Punjwani for Son's Death

A South Florida family has filed suit against a Fort Lauderdale doctor claiming he is responsible for their child's death and this is not the first time the doctor has been the center of controversy.

Dr. Sohail Punjwani who gave mind altering drugs to South Florida children could soon be going to court to defend his reasoning for prescribing the drugs. The mother of one of the boys spoke out about her son on Thursday.

"He was like a zombie, my son was like a zombie all the time," said Norma Tringali as she described the final days of her teen aged son Emilio Villamar.

Tringali told CBS4's Ted Scouten that her son was diagnosed as bi-polar and was treated by Dr. Sohail Punjwani. She claims her son was given a cocktail of drugs and that some that were not approved for children.

Villamar died of a heart attack at 16. Tringali said she was shocked when she heard the same doctor was treating 7-year old Gabriel Myers, who hanged himself April 16th in the bathroom of his Margate foster home.

Investigators are checking claims that he hanged himself, while also on a cocktail of drugs, some not approved for kids.

"When I learned that he was under the care of Dr. Punjwani, I say to myself, I will go forward and talk about it because maybe somebody else can learn from my tragedy," said Tringali, who actually filed the lawsuit four years ago.

Gabriel Myer's death spurred DCF Secretary George Sheldon to appoint a work group to study the agency's use of psychiatric drugs, and its compliance with a 2005 reform law on the use of such medications on children in state care.

Under the 2005 law, the Agency for Health Care Administration oversees a state program that monitors the prescribing of mental-health drugs to children under Medicaid, the state insurance program for the needy.

The program, called the Medicaid Drug Therapy Management Program, tracks the prescribing of mental-health drugs to children, and flags psychiatrists whose practices veer outside generally accepted protocols.

Among the practices that might draw attention: doctors with a high volume of prescriptions of mental-health drugs or potentially dangerous combinations of the medications. The program looks at the practices of about 17,000 doctors who prescribe medications to children on Medicaid, and about 300 to 450 end up red-flagged.

Dr. Sohail Punjwani, who was treating Gabriel and Emilio, had been red-flagged by the medication program every quarter that the list was kept, one of the administrators told CBS4 News partner The Miami Herald.

 http://westonlawyers.com/NewsInfo/SF-Family-Sues-Psychiatrist.html