Child Fatality Review Program

Primary: (404) 270-8715

Visit: (details)

3121 Panthersville Road
Decatur, GA 30034

Administration

Georgia’s Child Fatality Review Program (GCFR) was established in 1990 by statute (Section 19-15-1 et seq.). CFR is an independent program currently administered out of the Georgia Bureau of Investigation (GBI). The program is funded by state general funds. There are three state-level staff who are responsible for providing training and technical assistance. to the local Child Fatality Review committees. The state-level staff are also responsible for reviewing the accuracy and completeness of the case reports submitted by the local committees and ensuring data quality on an ongoing basis.

Purpose

The main purpose of Georgia’s CFR program is to prevent deaths. The mission of CFR is to serve Georgia’s children by promoting more accurate identification and reporting of child fatalities, evaluating the prevalence and circumstances of both child abuse cases and child fatality investigations, and monitoring the implementation and impact of the statewide child injury prevention plan to prevent and reduce incidents of child abuse and fatalities in the state.

Deaths eligible for review by local review committees are all deaths of children ages birth through 17 as a result of:

(1) sudden infant death syndrome;

(2) Any unexpected or unexplained conditions;

(3) Unintentional injuries;

(4) Intentional injuries;

(5) Sudden death when the child is in apparent good health;

(6) Any manner that is suspicious or unusual;

(7) Medical conditions when unattended by a physician. For this paragraph, no person shall be deemed to have died unattended when the death occurred while the person was a patient of a hospice licensed under Article 9 of Chapter 7 of Title 31; or

(8) Serving as an inmate of a state hospital or a state, county, or city penal institution.

Teams

Georgia has both state and local review teams which are mandated.

State Teams

The state team is called the Georgia Child Fatality Review Panel (GCFRP). The Panel is comprised of 17 members, which meets quarterly to oversee the county child fatality review process, report to the governor annually on the incidence of child deaths, and recommend prevention measures based on the data through their annual report. Panel members are appointed by the Governor or Lt. Governor or are ex-officio members as state agency leaders.

Local Teams

Georgia has 159 counties, and each county has its own CFR committee. The local committees have seven mandated agency members that are directed to meet within 30 days of a child’s death to review the case and to submit their findings within 67 days of the death. Local CFR committees are encouraged to invite additional agencies/organizations to the review meeting, as necessary. CFR policy also requires that a prevention advocate be a member of the local CFR committee, which makes up the eight members of the local CFR committee. The county coroner/medical examiner alerts the district attorney’s office or the designated chairperson of the local CFR committee when a death has occurred within the county. The District Attorney or designated chair initiates the child death review. Local committees are also encouraged to meet regularly, even if no deaths have occurred, to develop and review prevention efforts within their counties.

Websites

https://ncfrp.org/ - Access previous years reports.