Trust and health in Eastern Europe: Conceptions of a new society

Little attention has been paid to why trends and levels of mortality and morbidity differ in Eastern Europe and few studies have addressed people's own perceptions of their new political system – perceptions which per se may be important for social development. The aim of the present study was to analyse the extent to which trust and economic circumstances affect self‐rated health in Poland, Estonia and Russia and how much health differences between the countries can be explained by these factors. A better economy and higher trust were related to better individual health, while economic factors seemed most important for inter‐country differences. It is probable that both institutional factors and individual perceptions contribute to people's well‐being, but in terms of social policy, an improved welfare system may be the most effective way forward.     

社会医疗保险对老年人健康水平的影响：基于浙江省的实证研究

本研究根据2010年浙江省城乡老年人口生活状况调查的数据认为,对于老年人的社会医疗保险问题,不仅要关注保险覆盖面的扩大,更应关注不同保险项目参保老人之间的健康平等。在揭示医疗服务使用与健康水平负向关系这一主效应的基础上,研究发现,职工医保作为moderator可以改善使用较多医疗服务老人的健康水平,新农合的作用则相反。研究希望对医疗保险的改革思路进行反思,全民医保的改革思路不仅是医疗服务可及性的提高,更应该是不同社群享有平等的医疗福利,并最终促进健康结果的平等。     

俄罗斯的社会转型与社会阶层分化

20世纪80年代,俄罗斯社会开始转型,90年代以后,俄罗斯的社会阶层发生了明显的分化。本文主要从以下几个方面描述和分析俄罗斯的社会阶层分化：1、社会收入的差距（包括个人的收入差距,政府各部门之间、社会各行业之间的收入差距,俄罗斯区域间的收入差距）。2、“社会边缘群体”和“新贫困者”。“社会边缘群体”是一些不能确定自己的社会地位和群体归属的“被社会边缘化”的人群。“新贫困者”是指前苏联时期,以教授、工程师和医生等知识分子为主体的社会阶层,俄罗斯社会改革前,他们生活安逸,有很高的社会地位,而现在却生活艰难,变成了俄罗斯的穷人。3、新中产阶级。 俄罗斯在社会政治、经济转型过程中,旧的以知识分子为核心的社会中间阶层消失了,出现了新的以企业主为中心的中产阶级,俄罗斯新中产阶级的出现使俄罗斯的社会阶级结构发生了巨大的变化。     

The social role of alcohol in Russian culture

The year 1995 marks the tenth anniversary of the beginning of perestroika in Russia. The country has paid with its health for all the social, economic and political reforms. The chronic state of social stress, which is already in its tenth year, has led to a sharp growth in alcoholism and drug addiction, an increasing prevalence of neurosis and psychosomatic diseases and an increase in the death rate and decrease in the birth rate. This is the degeneration of the Russian nation. Alcohol stimulates and alcoholism indicates the process of self-destruction of the population. Unfortunately, there are no accurate statistics on alcohol consumption and problems in Russia today, as there is no state monopoly on alcohol production and sale and no common drug treatment service for the whole country. According to generalized estimates from epidemiological investigations, the average prevalence of alcoholism is 200–250 per 1000 adults, but this differs significantly in different professional groups: 10% of the workers in the nuclear energy industry suffer from alcoholism, 35% of the sailors, 22% of the workers in the machine-tool industry and 42% of the people working in the woodworking industry. There is one woman alcoholic for each 5 men. On average, only 1 of every 7 alcoholics seeks medical and social aid. The main cause of alcoholism is alcoholism itself -its uncontrolled and expanding reproduction. The investigation of alcoholism is being intensively removed from the clinical to the social sphere. It can be explained by understanding the role of social and psychological factors in the origin and development of alcoholism and the harsh socio-economic consequences and moral damage. The appearance of a new class of specialists - social workers - in Russia in 1991 was predetermined by these factors. The main objective of social workers is to fight social diseases and alcoholism in particular as the most terrible social disease of the Russian Federation. The history and place of alcohol in modern Russian culture, the stages and forms of the development of alcoholism and its ethnocultural peculiarities in different social strata of the population are described in this article. The reasons for and consequences of alcoholism are systematized, and the principles and directions of the activity of the social services in dealing with the treatment of alcoholism and rehabilitation of the diseased are defined.     

Help or hindrance? Social policy and the ‘social determinants of health’

In recent years, public health research has become increasingly focused on issues of social inequality and social disadvantage. This is because social issues, such as poor housing and unemployment, have been found to impact health significantly, and are now referred to as ‘the social determinants of health‘. As a result of this shift, public health is now principally concerned with what are historically considered to be social policy issues. This paper discusses the confluence of public health and social policy; it examines the opportunities and risks posed by this convergence for those working in social policy seeking to reduce poverty and inequality. We argue that, while much can be gained in the two fields by working more closely together, there remain fundamental differences in perspectives and approaches. In order to maximise benefits, these points of difference need to be thought through sooner rather than later.     

The Swiss social insurance system: Social security and grass‐roots democracy

The foundations of Switzerland's social insurance system can be traced to 1890 when a public referendum voted the inclusion of an article into the Federal Constitution that gave the executive the task of creating a sickness and accident insurance scheme. Currently, as in other European countries, the Swiss social insurance system is facing challenges as a result of rising health costs and demographic shifts, which are placing a growing burden on both public finances and private households. To reach policy decisions to address these challenges, the Swiss system is distinguishable from those of its European neighbours because of a continuing tradition of political decision‐making based on grass‐roots democracy: through referenda, the Swiss people remain directly responsible for the development of the national social insurance system. Importantly, not only might this unique feature of Swiss democracy lead the Swiss people more readily to accept and identify with their social insurance system but it may offer a sound democratic base upon which to build a consensual approach to address the policy challenges that lie ahead.     

Mental health in postgraduate social work curriculum: Review of training contents in Indian schools of social work

Training of social workers according to the changing needs of the society is important. To this end, we decided to review the adequacy of mental health training in postgraduate programme in social work. The Mental Health Care Act 2017 defines psychiatric social worker (PSW) in India to have additional higher qualification beyond post‐graduation in social work. The number of such qualified PSWs appears to be limited due to small number of institutes that offer advanced training in the country. Though, the number of available PSWs with such qualifications is rising, the manpower in proportion to the mental health needs in the country continues to remain low. It is therefore, relevant to review the quality of psychiatric social work education at postgraduate level if this level is to be considered as the desirable qualification for PSW. In this context, postgraduate social work syllabi from 71 universities including autonomous institutions were reviewed using semi‐structured assessment. The results show a lack of uniform teaching components, training methods and insufficient skill orientation towards mental health interventions. These observations suggest that curricula and training are modified with strengthening and enhancing the quality of training of mental health at post‐graduate level in Social Work.     

Studying the effects of social environment on health in China: challenges and solutions

Many factors have been identified as determinants of increasing health inequalities in China. Health research has focused mostly on individual- and family-level determinants, whereas the effects of social environment are largely left unexplored. This paper suggests the aspects of social environment to be studied in relation to health in the context of China. In addition, an integrated life course and ecological perspective is proposed to address some conceptual and methodological challenges identified in the current research.     

The effect of community organisations’ participation and existence on self-rated health in China: evidence from China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study

Using the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study cross-sectional survey in 2011 with an 80.51% response rate, an endogenous logit model is adopted to account for the relationship between social capital and self-rated health and the heterogeneity from gender, age and marital status on individual self-rated health status. Consequently, social capital at both individual and community levels is found to be positively correlated with better subjective self-rated health status. Furthermore, the social capital’s marginal effect of the male, high-income groups, the married are larger than that of the female, rural residents, low-income groups and the divorced. In addition, interclass correlation value from the partition of the fixed and random effect of social capital is significantly, ranging from 3.0 to 5.49%, indicating a significant proportion of the total variance in self-rated health that can be explained by community-level differences.     

Extending health care coverage: Potential linkages between statutory social security and community-based social protection

Abstract   The extension of social health protection in developing countries is widely recognized as a priority. Various financing and institutional methods can be used in pursuing this objective, but none of them can achieve universal coverage in the short term. Based on an analysis of the respective strengths and weaknesses of social health insurance and community-based health care schemes, this article demonstrates the high potential of coverage extension strategies that use a pluralistic institutional approach to establish linkages and exploit complementarities optimally. A typology of potential linkages among different methods is presented and their value added illustrated using country examples.     

Health informatics for older people: a review of ICT facilitated integrated care for older people

Growing demands on welfare services, arising from expanding populations of older people in many countries, has led policy makers to consider the use of information and communications technologies (ICTs) as a means to transform the cost-effective delivery of health and social care. The evidence for these claims is examined by reporting the main findings of a review of worldwide published literature documenting the adoption of health informatics applications to improve health and social care for older people. It focuses around two dimensions of the UK government's programme for 'modernising' public services, which emphasise the use of ICTs to facilitate the sharing of health and social services information and its potential to foster person-centred approaches to independent living. Findings suggest that there is little evidence that these dimensions have been realised in practice and the perceived incompatibility between them is more likely to produce expensive and ineffective health informatics outcomes.     

Transforming Social Group Work Learning into Competencies for Interprofessional Teams

This article describes how social work and social group work strategies are used to enhance social work student participation in an interprofessional education program (IPE) that includes social work and five health care disciplines. Concurrently, social work students take part in a small group to assist them in the application of their social group knowledge to their IPE experience. Interprofessional collaborations between social work and health care can work toward alleviating health inequalities and poor access to health services. Social work has a crucial and significant role within these teams because of the profession’s focus on individual well-being, within the context of their social environment and support systems.     

Public health care in the balance: exploring popular support for health care systems in the European Union

Which factors explain intra‐ and inter‐country variations in levels of public support for national health care systems within the European Union, and why? We propose that public opinion towards public health care is dependent on (1) the type of welfare state regime to which the various European welfare states belong, (2) typical features of the national care system and (3) individual social and demographic characteristics, which are related to self‐interest or morality oriented motives. To assess the explanatory power of these factors, data from the Eurobarometer survey series are analysed. Support for public health care appears to be particularly positively related to social‐democratic attributes of welfare states, whereas support drops with increasing degrees of liberalism and conservatism. Further, support for public health care proves to be associated with wider coverage and public funding of national care services. We also find higher levels of support in countries with scarce social services for children and the elderly, and larger proportions of female (part‐time) employment. Lastly, with respect to individual characteristics, we find remarkably little evidence for self‐interest oriented motives affecting the preference for solidary health care arrangements.     

社会网络与城乡居民的身心健康

本文根据大型抽样社会调查的数据,集中讨论了个人的社会网络对其精神健康和身体健康的影响,以及这种影响在城乡居民之间的差异。研究结果发现,个人的社会网络规模对身心健康均起着积极作用：紧密度高、异质性低、强关系多的“核心网络”对精神健康有积极影响,而相反特征的松散网络则对身体健康更有利,个人在网络中的相对地位对精神健康起着积极作用。此外,社会网络对健康的作用在农村地区表现得更为明显。作者还进一步讨论了这些研究发现的理论与政策意义。     

Vulnerable children's health as described in investigations of reported children

This study explores whether the social services weigh in health aspects, and what these may be, when investigating reported children's life situation. Information about physical and psychological health aspects for 259 children in 272 investigations was included. Overall, information about children's health was limited. Problematic emotions were the most commonly reported health aspect in the investigations, whereas suicidal thoughts, self‐harm behaviour and gastrointestinal and renal diseases were mentioned least of all. A cluster analysis revealed that the low level of health information group included the largest sample of data and consisted of investigations with minimal information about children's health. The three other cluster groups, Neurological diseases and psychosomatic symptoms, Emotional health and Physical and psychological health and destructive behaviour, consisted of investigations conducted mostly according to the model called Children's Needs In Focus (BBIC, in Swedish, Barns Behov i Centrum). Although these investigations also produced limited information, they provided more than those assessed as having a low level of information about health aspects. The conclusion is that it is necessary to increase information about health aspects in investigations if social welfare systems are to be able to fulfil their ambition of supporting vulnerable children's need of health care.     

Exploring Social Justice for Clinical Social Work Practice

This article explores social work practitioners' understanding of social justice and how understanding facilitates or impedes the pursuit of social justice within the practice field of mental health. Existing confusion and ambiguity regarding what social justice is poses a barrier to social justice pursuits. Analysis of qualitative interview data from practitioners resulted in a multidimensional conceptualization of social justice as social systems, resources, and transformative respect. Clinical social workers in the field of mental health with an enhanced understanding of social justice may be better prepared to meet the profession's social justice aims.     

遵从抑或濡染？班级同伴网络视角下的心理健康研究

本文超越了既有研究的个体网络视角,通过使用中国教育追踪调查（CEPS）的两期数据,考察班级同伴网络对学生心理健康的影响及其条件机制。本研究有如下发现：首先,在中国行政班级制度下,班级整体心理健康水平（社会遵从效应）和快乐同伴比例（快乐同伴效应）能够对学生的心理健康产生显著的正向影响,抑郁同伴比例与学生的心理健康呈显著负相关（抑郁同伴效应）;其次,学生更倾向于受到与自己心理健康观念和行为类似的同伴的影响,对于班级相对心理健康状况较差、中等、较好的学生而言,抑郁同伴效应、社会遵从效应和快乐同伴效应分别发挥显著的主导作用;最后,班级同伴网络对集体融入、亲子交流状况不同的学生的心理健康具有差异化的影响,随着集体融入和亲子交流的提高,抑郁同伴效应逐渐减弱,而社会遵从效应和快乐同伴效应逐渐增强。     

Economic crisis and social policy reform in Korea

The economic crisis that broke out in Korea in December 1997 has had a chilling impact on social development in the country. Today unemployment is the highest that Korea has experienced in the past thirty years. This paper aims to examine the impact of the economic crisis on social development and the role of public policy to mitigate the problems caused by the crisis. The economic crisis has hit vulnerable groups harder, increased the proportion of part-time and daily workers, and reversed the trend of steady improvement of income distribution. The economic crisis along with the trend of aging population, globalization, and competition calls for an expanded role of social policy, which the Korean government has neglected for a long time. The main targets of social policy reform in Korea include the expansion of government programs and safety nets for the unemployed and redesigning the national pension and health insurance scheme to provide adequate income security as well as to improve the system sustainability.     

Climate change in Alaska: Social workers’ attitudes,beliefs, and experiences

The average temperature in Alaska and the North American Arctic has risen at twice the rate of the global average due to climate change, causing changes to the natural environment that affect the physical, social, and emotional well‐being of people and communities. Social workers must be prepared to respond. Using a non‐probability, convenience sample, this study surveyed 159 social workers in Alaska to assess their attitudes and their perceptions of the effects of climate change on their clients and constituents. Results indicate that social workers in Alaska believe that climate change is happening, that human activities are responsible, and that it is a large threat to people in Alaska. Over 75% believe that climate change is dangerous for their clients now or will be dangerous in 10 years. Social workers report that in the past year their clients or constituents have experienced multiple climate change‐related problems with community infrastructure, health, and mental health.     

New Directions for the Study of Incarcerated Older Adults: Using Social Capital Theory

As the population of older adults continues to rise, so, too, does the population of older adults in prison. The body of literature on older adults in corrections is scant, particularly with regard to health and social functioning. Past studies of aging inmates primarily focus on health care and related costs. The purpose of this article is twofold: (a) outline and synthesize the research on older adults living in prison; and (b) propose a framework for future research and intervention development based on social capital theory. Recommendations for social work practice, programs, and research are discussed.