Missouri picks Cumulus for APS/AAA Direct Services
Deployment
The Missouri Association of Area Agencies on Aging (MA4) chose Cumulus for a statewide collaboration initiative to connect Adult Protective Services clients with HCBS. This project is a collaboration of MA4 and Missouri Adult Protective Services (APS) to deliver services and supports to clients of APS, with a goal of helping those clients remain in the least restrictive environment and improve their quality of life and health. The Cumulus hub is connecting 300+ Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services APS and AAA workers with rapid referrals and collaboration.
Department of Health and Senior Services (DHSS) APS workers will use Cumulus to create service requests for clients they’re working with. Once approved by designated staff at the DHSS, Cumulus will automatically route the service request to the AAA serving the appropriate geographic area. AAA staff will retrieve the service requests through the Cumulus hub and services will begin.
Even though organizations are using separate IT systems, the Cumulus hub enables them to share information, communicate, collaborate and improve outcomes for vulnerable adults needing important services and supports.
As the collaboration hub for ACL Challenge Grant winner Missouri Aging Services Data Collaborative (MASDC), Cumulus is pushing the interoperability envelope on behalf of AAAs. To encourage data sharing with healthcare, state agencies and community partners Cumulus and MASDC developed a groundbreaking set of standards to help AAAs share data in a uniform way nationwide.
The Cumulus collaboration platform grew directly from a need in the spring of 2020 for community partners to rapidly coordinate their response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Like community-based organizations nationwide, Aging Ahead, an Area Agency on Aging in the greater St. Louis area, faced daunting challenges as local communities and businesses went into lockdown. The demand for some services like home delivered meals skyrocketed, while delivery models for in-home services changed overnight. Using the ad hoc tools available, Aging Ahead and its partners coordinated outreach and service delivery, providing reassurance and services to socially and physically isolated shared clients across a huge geographic area. Relying on email, phone calls, spreadsheets, disconnected data systems and old-fashioned ingenuity they made it work – thousands of seniors and people with disabilities were served during that crucial time.