Montana WIC

Cogswell Building  1400 Broadway  Helena MT  59620

 

 

MEMORANDUM

 

TO:              Regional WIC Directors

 

FROM:         Joan Bowsher, Montana WIC Director

 

DATE:          March 25, 2008

 

NUMBER:     A-08-07

 

SUBJECT:    WIC Futures Study Group Request

 

The WIC Futures Study Group will be having their second meeting on Wednesday, March 19.  In order to provide the group with as much information on WIC services as possible, we are requesting your input in two areas.

 

1)  What are your five biggest "time takers" in WIC?

We have chosen 5 things that we believe take extra time away from our primary duties in WIC.

  1. Completing the time study on a quarterly basis & never getting any feedback on it.
  2. Multiple signatures required from staff & participant on several different forms for close to the same thing or forms that could be combined into one.
  3. Difficulty in client comprehension on specifically what they need to bring to complete the cert appt.  State & local agencies don’t always communicate well on what is considered appropriate, for example, as proof of residency or income. 
  4. Forms that participant  fills out don’t correlate with questions in the computer so time is taken to interview the client to complete the data for the computer, for example, pregnant woman:  how many years of education & EDD; Child over 1yr:  BW & BL & BF info.   If participant has gone to waiting room or to change a diaper, etc while staff enters data, client must be tracked down before appt can be completed.
  5. Contacting participants, either by phone or mail to remind them of their upcoming appt, then to let them know they missed, etc.    

 

 

 

 

2)  What does Montana WIC require of local agencies which is not required by WIC Federal           Regulations?

I’m not exactly sure on this but I think that MT WIC requires a HGB test more often than the Feds require.

 

 

Due to the approaching date of the next meeting, we are requesting your response quickly.  Please e-mail your response to these two questions to Lynn Van Aken (lvanaken@mt.gov) by Friday, March 14.

 

Thank you for your thoughtful input.  We are working hard to make WIC a successful quality nutrition program for the future.  If you have any questions please call me at 406-444-4747.