Adult Protective Services Acutely Vulnerable Adult Protocol County of San Diego, California

About the Program

Category: Health (Best in Category)

Year: 2015

The Adult Protecive Services (APS) Acutely Vulnerable Adult (AVA) Protocol began from the input of APS staff following the tragic death of a developmentally disabled young adult. A team of APS staff, with the help of a consultant, developed a definition of an Acutely Vulnerable Adult for the protocol. They are typically people who have severe cognitive or communication deficits that prevent them from protecting themselves from maltreatment AND who are highly dependent upon another person whom is assessed as being high risk for perpetrating abuse. An enhanced assessment was developed for assessing AVA identified clients along with targeted interventions to mitigate the risk to the vulnerable adult. The AVA protocol requires a high level of collaboration between the San Diego Regional Center (SDRC), Public Guardian (PG) and other community partners. And this collaboration has resulted in successful outcomes in several significant cases of neglect of AVA identified clients. An innovative and unique part of this protocol was the development of an Outcome Measure that is safety focused, and the after case follow-up. AVA cases remain open longer than a typical APS case and there is follow-up at various intervals after closing to confirm the continued safety of the client.