CASE STUDY: Human Needs Don’t Stop When A Pandemic Starts

How the COVID Clearpass app helped Easterseals Michigan deliver essential services.

The Problem

As the COVID-19 pandemic brought America’s workplaces to a grinding halt, Easterseals Michigan faced a dilemma: how to continue delivering essential services while keeping both, service recipients and employees safe. As a provider of various services, including outpatient behavioral health, in ten locations throughout the state of Michigan, Easterseals serves children and adults who count on the organization for in-person home, community, and office visits. COVID-19’s arrival meant the organization had to adapt to keep meeting peoples’ needs. And while telehealth systems enabled some services to continue remotely, the organization needed the means to swiftly resume essential in-person services while carefully tracking employee and client health, managing staff and office visits, and conducting required screening procedures.

The Solution

Through the COVID ClearPass app, Easterseals’ staff members can answer vital health screening questions, check office openings, reserve visitation times, and check-in and out of their visits on the web or their phones. Visitors can answer health questions and check-in for visits. Immediate notifications are provided to appropriate management in the event an employee or visitor fails the health screening, enabling a rapid response. Managers also have access to comprehensive reporting
functions that provide detailed data per facility/employee and other bases. Since the app’s data is housed within Easterseals’ Microsoft 365 environment, security, confidentiality, and HIPAA compliance are maintained.

The COVID ClearPass App Was Crucial

For Easterseals, COVID ClearPass provides a decided advantage over any alternative means of managing staff and acquiring essential data. “We wouldn’t have been able to do this and meet our reopening deadline,” Clarissa says. “We don’t have the internal resources to build an app from the ground up, and we would have had to resort to manual tools and spreadsheets. That would have consumed a lot more time and effort and been more prone to error. It would have been very sloppy to collect documents from 10 locations and almost 500 employees.”

ts who have benefitted from COVID ClearPass’ low- or no-cost model. “We’re oriented towards providing services, not spending money on IT or admin,” Clarissa says. “Arranging the logistics of returning to work was the hard part. COVID ClearPass helped make it simpler.”

The Result

Easterseals’ need for a rapid, effective solution in advance of their reopening deadline was met thanks to COVID ClearPass’s ease of implementation. “It was very easy to get up and running,” Clarissa says. “That’s how Red Level built it—it was clear that they wanted people to use it. We are a nonprofit with a lot going on, and Red Level had it up and running in no time—it was perfect.”

Significantly, the cost didn’t impose a barrier either: Red Level has released the Microsoft PowerApps version of the app for free, including written and video documentation and email support for organization administrators with the ability to deploy it for themselves. Easterseals opted for low-cost installation assistance and minimal customizations—modifications to the appearance to reflect the organization’s branding and the addition of extra screener questions. Red Level’s Megan Testani explains the
the decision to make the app free simply: “We needed businesses to get back to work safely, we developed an app that would help make this happen and made sure the app was available to as many organizations as possible, for free.”

The Easterseals organization is one of many Michigan area businesses and nonprofits who have benefitted from COVID ClearPass’ low- or no-cost model. “We’re oriented towards providing services, not spending money on IT or admin,” Clarissa says. “Arranging the logistics of returning to work was the hard part. COVID ClearPass helped make it simpler.”