RETAIN Statement B

Paperwork Reduction Act Submission:
Supporting Statement B for the Office of Disability Employment Policy (ODEP)

Retaining Employment and Talent after Injury/Illness Network (RETAIN) Demonstration Projects and Evaluation, OMB No. 1230-0NEW

March 2019

OMB SUPPORTING STATEMENT PRA PART B

Retaining Employment and Talent after Injury/Illness Network (RETAIN) Demonstration Projects and Evaluation

B.0 Circumstances Necessitating the Information Collection

The RETAIN Demonstration Projects are a collaborative effort led by the U.S. Department of Labor’s Office of Disability Employment Policy (ODEP) in partnership with DOL’s Employment and Training Administration (ETA) and the Social Security Administration (SSA). RETAIN—Retaining Employment and Talent After Injury/Illness Network—projects will test the impact of early intervention strategies that improve stay-at-work/return-to-work (SAW/RTW) outcomes of individuals who experience work disability while employed. “Work disability” is defined as an injury, illness, or medical condition that has the potential to inhibit or prevent continued employment or labor force participation.

SAW/RTW programs succeed by returning injured or ill workers to productive work as soon as medically possible during their recovery process and by providing interim part-time or light-duty work and accommodations, as necessary. The RETAIN Demonstration Projects are modeled after promising programs operating in Washington state, including the Centers of Occupational Health and Education (COHE), the Early Return to Work (ERTW), and the Stay at Work programs. While these programs operate within the state’s workers’ compensation system and are available only to people experiencing work-related injuries or illnesses, the RETAIN Demonstration Projects provide opportunities to improve SAW/RTW outcomes for both occupational and non-occupational injuries and illnesses of people who are employed, or at a minimum in the labor force, when their injury or illness occurs.

Central to these projects is the early coordination of health-care and employment-related supports and services to help injured or ill workers remain in the workforce. These supports and services include:

• Training in occupational health best practices for participating health-care providers;

• Active involvement of a Return-to-Work Coordinator throughout the medical recovery period to facilitate continued employment;

• Enhanced communication among workers, employers, and health-care providers;

• Accommodations and job modifications; and

• Retraining and rehabilitation services.

To accomplish this, projects will provide services through an integrated network of partners that includes close collaboration between state/local workforce development entities, health-care provider systems/networks, and other partners as appropriate.

The primary goals of the RETAIN Demonstration Projects are:

1. To increase employment retention and labor force participation of individuals who acquire, and/or are at risk of developing, work disabilities; and

2. To reduce long-term work disability among project participants, including the need for Social Security Disability Insurance and Supplemental Security Income.

The ultimate purpose of the demonstration is to validate and expand implementation of evidence-based strategies to accomplish these goals.

DOL will administer and manage the grants as well as manage a third-party provider of programmatic technical assistance, while SSA will manage a third-party independent evaluation of the grant program. A separate PRA package will be submitted by SSA.

In order to assess whether the RETAIN projects are serving the target populations through coordinated care and achieving RETAIN’s primary goals, DOL and SSA need to collect information that will assist the project's performance management and continuous quality improvement efforts, as well as the third-party evaluation effort, by providing baseline information relating to worker participants and also providing quarterly updates relating to project performance. SSA will submit a separate ICR for any data collection and use efforts they plan to undertake to evaluate the RETAIN projects.

Information collection instruments included in this package:

• Baseline Participant Form Part 1

• Baseline Participant Form Part 2

• SSA Authorization of Disclosure Form

Other items included in this package:

• Quarterly Progress Report Appendix A

• Appendix A Program Data Collection Tool

• Appendix A Individual Level Data Collection Tool

• RTW Coordinator Data Collection Tool

• 60-Day FRN

B.1 Respondent Universe and Sample

The purpose of the RETAIN information collection, both baseline worker participant data and quarterly project performance data, is to understand and assess RETAIN program start-up, pilot projects, and full implementation. In addition, worker participant data will be used as baseline data in RETAIN program evaluation activities conducted by SSA’s third-party independent evaluator.

The Baseline Participant Forms will be provided to the grantees by ODEP and are included in this package. Part 1 will be completed by each worker participant seeking to enroll in RETAIN. Part 2 will be completed by the health-care provider and/or Return-to-Work Coordinator for each worker participant at the time of enrollment. SSA requires that each worker participant complete an Authorization of Disclosure form, allowing SSA to use the participant’s data. No sampling or other method is used to select a subset of respondents. The respondent universe consists of everyone attempting to enroll in RETAIN, and all grantees are required to collect this data. The number of grantees is 8 during Phase 1 (18 months) and is expected to be 4 during the first part of Phase 2 (18 months). As described in the burden table in Statement A, the number of enrollees is expected to be 500 per grantee in Phase 1 (18 months) and 3000 per grantee in the first part of Phase 2 (18 months).

Guidance will be provided by ODEP on metrics to collect for the Quarterly Progress Report Appendix A, which is a required submission for all grantees. There is also a narrative component to the Quarterly Progress Report, which is not addressed here. Included in this package are three files relating to submission of Quarterly Progress Report Appendix A, consisting of two spreadsheets (Appendix A Program Data Collection Tool and Appendix A Individual Level Data Collection Tool) succinctly listing performance metrics as well as a text document (Quarterly Progress Report Appendix A) describing these metrics in detail. One spreadsheet (Appendix A Individual Level Data Collection Tool) concerns individual-level data, solely for worker participants in the treatment group, which will be stripped of any personally-identifying information (PII) such as names, addresses, or dates of birth, before being sent by the grantees to ODEP. All data submitted concerning health-care providers, Return-to-Work Coordinators, and employers will be in aggregate and entered into the other spreadsheet (Appendix A Program Data Collection Tool). Furthermore, we are providing an optional Return-to-Work Coordinator data collection tool to assist grantees in recording the information needed for related metrics that will be entered in the spreadsheets.

Table B-1.1 Respondent Universe and Response Rates

Study Component/Form	No. of Respondents in Universe	No. of Responses in Sample	Expected Response Rate
Baseline Participant Form Part 1	16,000	16,000	100%
Baseline Participant Form Part 2	16,000	16,000	100%
SSA Authorization of Disclosure Form	16,000	16,000	100%
Quarterly Progress Report Appendix A	8 in Phase 1 4 in Phase 2	8 in Phase 1 4 in Phase 2	100%

B.2 Statistical Methods for Sample Selection and Degree of Accuracy Needed

ODEP anticipates state agencies and health-care partners will use existing IT systems to the extent possible for collecting data. The completion of the Authorization of Disclosure form will be integrated with the informed consent process provided to worker participants by the grantees to meet the requirements of the grantees’ health-care partners and institutional review boards. Quarterly Progress Reports will be completed and submitted electronically, to minimize burden. Grantees will be able to submit Quarterly Progress Reports to ODEP using a secure FTP platform.

No statistical methodologies are used for stratification or sample selection, either for the enrollees or for the grantees. No estimation procedures are used. There are no unusual problems requiring specialized sampling procedures. These forms are completed for each enrollee during the enrollment process, so there is no periodicity for this data collection. The Quarterly Progress Reports, including Appendix A, will be sent by each grantee to DOL after the end of each quarter, excluding the first three quarters when there will be little reportable data. A thorough description of variables being collected by DOL, and the sources of these variables, can be found in the Quarterly Progress Report Appendix A text document. Data received by DOL concerns the treatment group only and is intended to be used for grant/program management and descriptive statistics. Impact analysis using data concerning both the treatment group and control/comparison group will be conducted by the independent evaluator, which is covered by SSA’s separate PRA package.

B.3 Maximizing Response Rates and Addressing Nonresponse

Each enrollee must complete the Baseline Form Part 1 and the Authorization of Disclosure form during enrollment, while the health-care provider and/or Return-to-Work Coordinator will complete for each enrollee the Baseline Form Part 2. Lack of completion of these forms will prevent enrollment, meaning that response rates for enrollees will be 100%. Any missing data for enrollees will be collected by the Return-to-Work Coordinator. No sampling is involved. Each grantee must submit a Quarterly Progress Report after the end of each quarter (other than the first three). The metrics contained in the Quarterly Progress Report Appendix A will be used by DOL for program administration. A thorough description of variables being collected by DOL, and the sources of these variables, can be found in the Quarterly Progress Report Appendix A text document.

B.4 Test Procedures

The Baseline Form Part 1, which will be completed by enrollees, was tested on five DOL employees to ensure clarity and ease of burden. The Authorization of Disclosure form is a standard SSA form. The Baseline Form Part 2 will be completed by health-care providers and/or Return-to-Work Coordinators, largely using information such as ICD-10 code diagnosis that will already have been obtained by health-care providers.

B.5 Contact Information & Confidentiality

Those consulted on the content of these instruments include the grantees (contact information below), SSA (contact information below), the independent evaluator (contact information below), and the following:

ETA (DOL): Kellen Grode, [email protected], (202) 693-3534

Steve Rietzke, [email protected], (202) 693-3912

OMB (EOP): Jamie Wilson, [email protected], (202) 395-2139

Contact information for the grantees who will collect this information is as follows:

California: Eric Glunt, [email protected], (707) 331-5636

Kimberlee Meyer, [email protected], (916) 654-5468

LaJuana Thompson, [email protected], (916) 657-5280

Connecticut: Karen Quesnel, [email protected], (860) 263-6527

Bill Shaw, [email protected], (860) 679-8946

Kansas: Dale Tower, [email protected], (316) 771-6800

Nigel Soria, [email protected], (785) 296-1705

Kentucky: Cora McNabb, [email protected], (502) 564-4440

Becky Cabe, [email protected], (502) 782-3415

Chithra Adams, [email protected], (859) 218-0245

Minnesota: May Thao-Schuck, [email protected], (651) 259-7563

Amy Carlson, [email protected], (651) 259-7542

Ohio: Tom Hutter, [email protected], (614) 466-9466

Vermont: Stephen Monahan, [email protected], (802) 828-2138

Karen Huyck, [email protected], (617) 308-1079

Christine McDonough, [email protected], (412) 383-4603

Washington: Hillary Rossi, [email protected], (360) 902-9507

Contact information for DOL, which will obtain the Quarterly Progress Reports, including Appendix A that will contain metrics derived from data collected by the Baseline Participant Forms, is as follows:

DOL: David Rosenblum, [email protected], (202) 693-7840

Chris McLaren, [email protected], (202) 693-7898

Contact information for SSA and the independent evaluator, who will obtain and use part of the data collected by the forms, is as follows:

SSA: Jackson Costa, [email protected], (410) 965-2934

Emily Roessel, [email protected], (202) 358-6138

Evaluator: Dave Wittenburg, [email protected], (609) 945-3362

Laura Kosar, [email protected], (202) 484-5268