Strong Start is an easy, centralized way to keep track of developmental screening records. Parents, guardians, and health care providers can use it to enter the results of screenings that have already been completed, wherever they took place. Families will have an ongoing record they can share with early care and education providers, like you. This will help ensure children get screenings when they need them. It will also help prevent duplicate screenings.
Are you an early care and education provider who conducts developmental screenings at your site?
- Create lifetime records - If you complete the screening with a family, encourage parents to enter the results in Strong Start. That way they will have a lifetime record of their child’s screenings that they can access at any time.
- Support developmental monitoring - If the child has been screened somewhere else and their information has been entered into Strong Start, parents will be able to share the results with you.
As the system becomes more widely used, we will be able to generate reports that can be useful to early care and education providers.
Note: The reports don’t identify any individual records. The screening data will help us better understand how many children are receiving developmental screenings and what resources are needed to support children and families in Washington.
Frequently Asked Questions for Early Care and Education Providers
- What do you mean by “Early Childhood Partners”?
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Early care and education providers are professionals who provide early care, early learning, and supports to children. Examples would be licensed childcare providers, Head Start/Early Head Start, home visitors, Early Achievers, Early Childhood Education and Assistance Program (ECEAP), and Early Support for Infants and Toddlers (ESIT).
- How can childcare and early learning providers benefit from the Strong Start system?
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When you encourage parents to use Strong Start, you can help them stay on track with screenings and help eliminate the need to re-do a screening. If a screening was completed in another setting, parents can share the information with you, and you can have a conversation about the results.
- Is Strong Start used to complete the screening, or just to record the results?
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Strong Start is for recording information from a screening that has already been completed. Records include demographic information, date and location of the screening, the results, whether there was a concern, and whether there was a referral for further evaluation or services.
- It would be helpful if we could access the system directly. Are there plans to expand user access?
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Yes. We plan to expand access so early care and education providers can register as users. It must be done in a way that protects the privacy of a child’s health record and ensures information is shared only with parental permission. For now, only parents, legal guardians and licensed healthcare providers can access Strong Start.
- What screening tools are included in the Strong Start system?
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The information below provides high-level information on the tools in Strong Start. You can find additional information on each tool using the embedded hyperlinks.
ASQ-3: Ages and Stages Questionnaires, 3rd edition
Available in Spanish, Arabic, Chinese, French
Brookes PublishingNumerical scores in 5 domains:
- Communication
- Gross motor
- Fine motor
- Problem solving
- Personal social
Scores grouped into:
- Above cutoff
- Near cutoff
- Below cutoff
ASQ:SE-2: Ages & Stages Questionnaires: Social-Emotional, Second Edition
Available in Spanish, Arabic, French
Brookes PublishingNumerical scores in 7 domains:
- Interaction with people
- Self-regulation
- Compliance
- Social communication
- Adaptive functioning
- Autonomy
- Affect
Scores grouped into:
- Monitor
- Above cutoff
- Near cutoff
- Below cutoff
SWYC: Survey of Wellbeing of Young Children
Includes autism-screening tool
Culturally sensitive, available in Spanish, Khmer, Burmese, Nepali, Portuguese, Haitian-Creole, Arabic, Somali and Vietnamese.
Tufts UniversityNumerical scores in 3 domains
- Developmental
- Emotional/behavioral
- Family context
Scores grouped into:
- Further investigation needed
- Below average range
- Average range
- Above average range
M-CHAT-R: Modified Checklist for Autism in Toddlers, Revised with Follow-up
Available in numerous languages, although validation of these translations is still underway.
©Robbins, et alNumerical scores in 3 domains
- Communication
- Social
- Behavior
Identifies risk (not a diagnosis)
- Low
- Med
- High
- What are the recommended ages/intervals for developmental screening?
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Developmental screening can be part of routine well-child visits or conducted anytime the parent or provider has a concern. The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends developmental screening at 9, 18, and 24 or 30 months, and autism-specific screening at 18 and 24 months.
- The conversation with parents/families can be sensitive. What resources are there to help early childhood partners with those conversations?
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Yes, these conversations can be sensitive! Parents may wonder if they “did something wrong” when a developmental concern is identified. You can help reassure them. Below are some resources to help with those conversations:
- Learn the Signs, Act Early, Centers for Disease Control
- Conversation Roadmap, Brazelton Touchpoints Center
Other questions? Please contact us at StrongStart@doh.wa.gov.