Case Management Officer

**Overview**

KidSTART at NUH is a government-led initiative which seeks to provide support services to vulnerable pregnant mothers. This program has been highly successful in helping underprivileged pregnant mothers deliver a healthy baby and to ensure that the newborn gets the best start in life. Through home visits, the program actively engages families, social/community partners and government agencies to provide systematic, integrated and holistic support. The program aims to engage families from the early pregnancy period to maximize the health of both mother and baby, to support breastfeeding and to foster mother-child bonding so as to enhance child development and potential during the first 3 years of life.

The Case Management Officer’s role is to provide holistic support for pregnant mothers and their newborns. The overall aim is to enhance the families’ knowledge and compliance to medical advice so that the pregnancy proceeds smoothly. After delivery, the case management officer works closely with the rest of the KidSTART at NUH team of medical social workers, nurses and clinicians, in order that the care and development of the new-born is optimized as far as possible. The case management officer helps to facilitate and coordinate support from all relevant community agencies for the benefit of the pregnant mother and the newborn.

**Responsibilities**:

- Cultivate a positive relationship with eligible families in the antenatal clinic so as to enroll them into the NUH KidSTART Home Visitation Programme.
- Continue the positive relationship with parents/caregivers to help ensure that the pregnancy progresses smoothly.
- Help impart child development knowledge and skills to KidSTART parents after delivery.
- Create and facilitate learning opportunities for parents in the areas of parent-child interaction, development-centred parenting and family well-being.
- Implement child development assessment tools to customise the intervention.
- Motivate, assess and monitor the parents' ability to conduct child development interventions effectively
- Provide information and knowledge on medical, dental, mental health services, early childhood development, developmental issues for families and children, with support from a multi-disciplinary team comprising paediatricians and nurses, and healthcare, early childhood and social service providers.
- Excellent collaborative skills to partner community and social service agencies (eg. FSCs, SSOs) to provide the necessary support for the families and their children, which includes regular case conferences and discussions.
- Participate actively and contribute to discussions in team meetings, supervision sessions, training and multidisciplinary case reviews.
- Contribute to the regular reviews of existing programmes and processes with the team.
- Consistency in administrative work, provision of data and information on cases in a timely manner.

**Requirements**:

- Degree in Early Childhood Development, Psychology, Social Work, Counselling or equivalent.
- Passionate and committed to work with vulnerable pregnant mothers and their children
- Empathetic towards the needs and challenges of vulnerable pregnant mothers and their children
- Excellent team player with good interpersonal and communication skills
- Capacity to reflect on key strengths and needs and motivated to enhance personal effectiveness and efficiency at work
- Flexible and nimble towards organisational change and development
- Motivated towards learning and professional development
- Willing and able to work on some weekday evenings and weekends
- Work experience in the early childhood development or social service sectors would be an advantage.