Fairfax County said artificial intelligence is helping social workers spend less time on paperwork and more time connecting with families.
For social workers, taking notes and completing paperwork can be time-consuming and make it harder to focus on the people they’re trying to help. To combat that, Fairfax County is using a system called Beam Notes to assist with documentation, and early results appear promising.
“When I’m meeting with a client, I’m able to actually create face-to-face eye contact with them. I’m constantly looking at them, talking to them, rather than head down typing a note on a computer,” Brahema Molubah, a family safety practitioner with the county, said.
Molubah said the technology helps him stay engaged with families because it assists with note-taking and paperwork.
The system works much like AI documentation tools used in health care. Using a computer or tablet, social workers can start a transcription that captures information needed for case notes while filtering out information that may not be relevant. At the end of a meeting, the system can also help generate required paperwork.
Before a conversation is recorded, families must consent to the technology’s use. If they decline, social workers turn to typing or pen-and-pad note-taking.
Alycia Blackwell, deputy director of Fairfax County’s Department of Family Services, said the county has seen measurable benefits since adopting the system.
“We’ve seen a 51% reduction in administrative time that it takes our staff to complete their case notes,” Blackwell said.
She said Beam Notes helps reduce paperwork while allowing social workers to focus more on families.
“We’re committed to keeping the human in human services, and AI has really helped us do that,” Blackwell said.
She said the technology may also help reduce burnout among employees.
“It’s helped our staff make that work-life balance a little more achievable by removing some of those administrative burdens,” Blackwell said.
Molubah said the technology has significantly reduced the time he spends on documentation.
“It saves me at least a whole day, a week by using Beam,” he said.
Alex Stephany, founder and CEO of the UK-based Beam, said information collected through the system is not used to train AI models. He said Beam is compliant with privacy law and stores encrypted data in the United States and requires human review before information becomes part of a case record.
“Every single document is always checked by a human being,” Stephany said.
He said the technology is designed to reduce administrative work so social workers can spend more time helping people.
“The reason people get into this line of work is not to do paperwork; it’s to help people,” Stephany said.
Molubah said the time savings have also improved his work-life balance.
“I’m more excited to do my work now than when I first started,” he said.
Molubah said he no longer worries about spending hours at home completing paperwork.
“My work-life balance now is so much better than how what it was a year ago,” he said.
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