Another special sheet, now an accepted part of our records, is the "relative sheet." Here is summarized the record of any relative known to the Associated Charities or to some kindred organization. Such records often give exceedingly valuable informa tion which helps materially in working out plans of treatment, and it is convenient to have these facts readily available. This is especially true when there is some mental or moral defect or when the group of related families is a large one. In some instances genetic charts have been made, and copies of them attached to the records.

The forms and uses of summaries are so many and so varied that it is hardly possible to do more than mention here those which we have found most valuable. A suggested variation of Miss Richmond's diagnostic summary is a "diagnostic and prognostic" summary, which gives a forward, as well as a backward, look. Too often our records give us only the liabilities of our clients. Their assets may be known to the visitor, but are not usually set down unless there is some definite plan for recording them. This is provided by the "diagnostic and prognostic" summary. Here are listed both the assets and the liabilities of each member of the family, in health, education, employment, recreation, and religion, and in its aims and ideals, and for each also a statement as to what the visitor thinks are the possibilities of developing the assets and lessening the liabilities. If made at regular intervals, say in the spring and fall, such prognostic summaries would give us a means of measuring our progress and so determining whether or not it was commensurate with the effort expended.

Summaries with somewhat the same idea, but less elaborate, were made last fall for a special study of co-operation undertaken by the Minneapolis Council of Social Agencies. In addition to facts regarding co-operation, there were listed the family's problems, and the finished and unfinished plans for their treatment.

Another form of summary frequently used is the one made for some special purpose. Recently "health summaries" were made of a number of incapacitated men, when the diagnosis and treatment of their ills had been particularly unsatisfactory. The record was carefully searched for all statements as to the man's health. These were arranged chronologically, and another summary made of all reports from doctors or dispensaries. This latter corresponds to the medical sheet suggested by Mrs. Sheffield. Such a detailed health summary was found especially valuable in case of a mental twist.

More elaborate summaries have been based on the questionnaires of Social Diagnosis. At one time a group of desertion cases was so studied, at another certa immigrant families. A sample of the latter was published recently in The Fam as "A Bohemian Background." We have tried to make at least one such study each of the immigrant groups with which we deal, assembling thus material whic would help in understanding other families of the same group. Equally elaborate have been the psychiatric histories, made under the direction of a mental hygiene worker of certain clients presenting definite mental problems. Occasionally we have a client who is unusually resourceful in prevarication, and whose ste quite confusing. By means of summaries we have compared point by point, for aid in further investigation and in treatm must be carefully annotated by reference to the record for fur circumstances under which the stories were told.

All of these devices for assembling the material buried in ou time and thought-more perhaps than would be required to sort

tter in the first place by some such method as the divided record. But under esent conditions it seems a safer method. We shall always have the original record : further study.

One other method of assembling material, too often overlooked, is from the records other agencies. Our standards of record-keeping are many and diverse, yet ere is scarcely any record so meager that it may not add something to our stock i knowledge about a family and so help us to a better understanding. Illustrating his was the work done by a group of students in collecting and combining information egarding families known to a number of agencies in order that plans might be worked ut on the basis of this fuller knowledge. Further evidence of its need came in the case studies, before mentioned, made by the Council of Social Agencies. When we saw before us in parallel columns the information about a family on which each agency had based its plan, we realized, as never before, how often those plans went askew for lack of knowledge which another agency possessed. Is it too much to hope that some day our work may be so correlated that such pooling of information will become routine matter? That a family's problems may be treated as a whole, through concerted effort, rather than piecemeal and at cross-purposes? If so, we shall need to perfect our machinery for preserving that information in accessible form both for our own use and for that of others.

With rising standards of case work and with a widening field for our efforts, our records are sure to grow more and more bulky. Care in writing will eliminate much in verbosity, repetition, negative entries, or "behold-me-busy" details, but whether we seek to condense them further or to summarize their contents, we must accept the fact that more time would be needed for the process. Nor can we console ourselves with the thought that it will save time in the end. It will not, but it will insure us better case work and that, after all, is the main purpose of our records.

Further instances arise in which the client is relayed through more than one individual to the society. Intermediaries should be ascertained at the time the report is received, not left to be discovered after difficulties have piled up.

Thus in general the interest of the "Source" in the destitute person, the nature of his contact with the client or the intermediary should be learned from the "Source" at the time when he is asking something, and the society has made no more and therefore assumed no responsibility.

Such requests as, "Please visit Mrs. Amaralo but do not let her know I sent you," are occasionally received. Right here is a place to stop and explain that social case workers are professional people, performing delicate tasks the basis of which must be frankness and full understanding. If the interest of the "Source" is genuine he will usually consent that his name be used. Conversely what assurance has the "Source" that the client wishes the ministrations of the society? Isn't it wiser that he consult the potential client and secure his consent to a visit? There is an immorality in bandying people around without their consent; they have some rights in determining what steps are to be taken in their behalf; an application of the principle "by and with the consent of the governed" would clear up such situations; and the result is the worker's visit to the client as the expected emissary instead of as an unexplained and unexplainable intruder. Of course here as in all statements concerning human relationships there are exceptions.

Then there are the host of requests for visits in which the "Source" wishes the society to act in the dark. One agency writes, "Please visit Mrs. Wilson and ascertain her financial and social footing, as an attorney in our town has received a letter from her." It is justifiable to reply that we are unwilling to act without knowing the purpose of our action. “Will you kindly write us the nature of the inquiry and the name of the attorney?" On receipt of this information a visit reveals Mrs. Wilson as merely a blind used by the collection department of a mail order house, and the inquiry to the attorney an effort to locate a defaulting customer.

Agencies too make mistakes in referring. A correctional agency refers a family known to them through a complaint of child neglect, stating, "We have called three times but found no one at home. We know there is destitution there; will you please call?" A school principal asks that some ductless gland extract may be supplied for the treatment of a child in the subnormal room. Her interest is encouraged, but her request is sent to the proper medical agency.

The majority of references by other agencies are proper charges upon a caseworking agency. Detecting the minority which are not properly referred is dependent upon a minute knowledge of the functions, possibilities, and limitations of other agencies.

Effort on the part of anyone to refer a client anonymously should be vigorously challenged. This is possible if the method is personal or by telephone. The society should refuse to accept the responsibility. If, however, an anonymous letter is received there seems no recourse but to visit, advising the client of the anonymous nature of the report and retreating as gracefully as possible if the client so advises.

After accepting a report of an individual in need of some social service, there still seems to remain the necessity "to survey the subject of investigation to discover whether someone else has not already gathered the necessary data." To fail to do this is to ignore a decade's growth of social agencies, technique in social work, and the development of the confidential exchange.

Unless social workers are to continue "flying around in futile motion," as Mr. McLean has said, a technique as a preliminary to the initial interview is necessary. The confidential exchange contains the bibliography in case work analogous to that in the field of science.

Theoretically, every social worker uses the confidential exchange. Practically, many use it only partially and intermittently, some so negligibly as to amount to disuse, and none to capacity. "Desire doth outrun accomplishment" sadly in this regard. The reasons for this are in no way unadmirable; the personality of the urging human being obscures for the case worker his theory and technique. The appealing personality also arouses in the case worker a desire amounting almost to jealousy to be the one to solve the client's troubles. To consult the confidential exchange is to imply a doubt of the client's pristine need, is to relinquish this feeling of sole responsibility.

Trite as it may sound, the preliminary to an initial interview is ascertaining which other agencies, if any, have known the client and in consulting them. Occasionally preliminary information gained permits consultation with public documents before the initial interview. Ownership of property, compensation secured, court records of divorce or separate maintenance, or criminal prosecution, any or all, if consulted before initial contact with the family, preclude misunderstandings or vagaries and sometimes protect the clients from the temptation to deceive. With this preliminary work accomplished the case worker approaches the home of the client with calmness for a first interview. He is free from any harassing sense of insecurity, due to the request of secrecy or evasiveness. He also possesses a knowledge of the client's background gleaned from other agencies or the equally valuable information that the client is unknown to other agencies.

The first interview is usually assumed to mean the first interview the representative of this case working agency has with this client. For the purposes of this discussion I place a new interpretation upon the first interview and describe it as the first interview this particular case worker has had with this client, although a record of former contact by the agency exists.

One large city agency reports 33 per cent of its cases last year as new, the remainder as formerly known to the agency. This fact, together with the high turn-over, means that the case worker's time to a significant extent must be spent reading these "old case records."

Typical of this class is the Calder case: the juvenile court reported that Mrs. Calder asked for relief, that her three children were in an institution, that blish her home, and that in their judgment she should be aided; denied her children because of poverty. It was true she

she had now reformed. Miss Benson of the case ly known Mrs. Calder, settled at her desk with the December 29, 1914. It comprised 34 sheets of 0,200 words, with 154 letters sent and received. some time during every year for seven years. erning the family and a record of expenditures

She concentrated upon her task to discover what revealing matter of Mrs. Calder's character and possibilities as a mother and homemaker were contained therein. She waded through hopeless pages of recitals of trivial matters, even found, carefully recorded in 1915, "Telephoned Board of Health, line busy, will call again." She read of the family's recurrent request for aid and of assistance given; of Mrs. Calder's recitals of her illness; of the death of Mr. Calder, struck by a wagon; of the children's illnesses, whooping cough, scarlet fever, meningitis; of the death of two children in quick succession; of how in 1919 Mrs. Calder's married daughter invited her to come and live with her in Whitefield, and how in October, 1920, Mrs. Calder accepted the invitation after the Industrial Commission had dismissed the claim for damages for her husband's death on the ground that he was a casual laborer. Then, events moved more rapidly; the society in Whitefield wrote they were returning her and instantly she was there.

Miss Benson mused over her notes. What had she really learned of Mrs. Calder as a woman, and of her children? What verified facts were there in the record? What clues for future procedures? When assembled they were very limited. Essentially Miss Benson's first contact with Mrs. Calder proved to be an initial interview. The information she had gleaned from reading the record of her own society was merely part of the preliminary surveying of the field and in the same category as facts gleaned from the records of other societies.

As this is true of Mrs. Calder, so it obtains with an appreciable percentage of the "old cases" comprising 33 per cent of the year's work. Exactly what portion of that third of the work is in this group is problematical, but assuredly it is large enough to deserve serious consideration and special technique. It might be argued that had the work of previous years been well done, this initial interview would be unnecessary. Granting that the work was well done according to past standards, the continually rising standards will increasingly demand inauguration of new procedure. In this social work nothing is static-all is influx.

The burden of the recurrence of such "old cases" placed upon all societies is considerable. How to organize to meet it is an administration problem worthy of discussion elsewhere. Therefore it is demonstrated that before the initial interview there exists need of a pre-initial interview technique. This technique, developed through the exigencies of the complexity of social workers, of the multiplication of agencies, and the accumulation of data concerning individual families, is gradually taking form. Paradoxical as it may sound, in proportion as this technique is recognized and increasingly utilized will its need tend to disappear.

with other Wing and

Chapin says of the scientific chemist that three-fourths of his time is spent reading the literature of his subject and one-fourth is spent in the laboratory. With the application of this pre-initial interview technique, an increasing proportion of the social case worker's time is spent in reading records and in con agencies and individuals, in telephoning and writing, and in analyzing material. The familiar phrase "I will visit the fam in the diminishing number of emergencies, is coming to be a de unplanned effort.

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