Variations in provider capacity to offer accessible health care for people with disabilities

Since social workers are likely to practice in a range of health care settings, their training focusing on human behavior in the social environment could help providers develop strategies to improve access to care for people with disabilities. In this article, results from a comprehensive survey of providers about access to health care for people with a broad range of disabilities are reported. Results suggest that a minority of providers report difficulty serving people with disabilities. However, dentists and mental health/substance abuse providers are significantly less likely than other providers to report that they provide accessible services to individuals with disabilities. These providers are less likely to report having had training related to mobility impairments, providing mirrors at their facility, having an accessible door, or providing assistance with personal care needs, and are more likely to report that their building poses a barrier for people with disabilities. Social workers are well positioned to take a leadership role in working with providers and patients to improve access to health care for people with disabilities. A social work framework of understanding the individual in a social environment may be the most appropriate perspective for creating innovative strategies for addressing the complex, multidimensional needs of people with disabilities who experience limited access to care.     

The frontline delivery of activation: workers’ preferences and their antecedents

This article intends to contribute to the increasing body of academic literature on the frontline delivery of activation policies. In line with the broader literature on frontline work, this literature focuses attention on frontline delivery practices and preferences and how these can be explained. Activation work is an interesting case in this context, because activation workers’ jobs designs vary considerably and workers have a diversity of educational backgrounds (including but not limited to social work) in the many countries that have implemented activation policies. This article looks at workers’ preferences rather than actual delivery practices. It analyses how job design and educational background are related to workers’ preferences concerning servicing clients, managing activation workers and spending time on various activation-related activities. Although the findings of the research that are presented in the article show that educational background and job design play only a modest role as antecedents of workers’ preferences, future research into this issue remains interesting. For it may help to increase our insights into the optimal match between what activation aims to achieve and how the provision of activation is organized on the one hand, and workers’ skills/qualifications and job design on the other hand.     

Improving the quality of child welfare services: needs assessment for staff training

Competency-based needs assessment surveys can be useful in assessing worker training needs in child welfare. Worker and supervisor surveys, consisting largely of task-based ability statements, constitute the core of this approach. Additional information can also be obtained from supervisors and allied professionals. Data from a study of 276 frontline child welfare workers in Alaska and Oregon are used to illustrate the utility of this approach.     

Variations in Provider Capacity to Offer Accessible Health Care for People with Disabilities

Abstract

Since social workers are likely to practice in a range of health care settings, their training focusing on human behavior in the social environment could help providers develop strategies to improve access to care for people with disabilities. In this article, results from a comprehensive survey of providers about access to health care for people with a broad range of disabilities are reported. Results suggest that a minority of providers report difficulty serving people with disabilities. However, dentists and mental health/substance abuse providers are significantly less likely than other providers to report that they provide accessible services to individuals with disabilities. These providers are less likely to report having had training related to mobility impairments, providing mirrors at their facility, having an accessible door, or providing assistance with personal care needs, and are more likely to report that their building poses a barrier for people with disabilities. Social workers are well positioned to take a leadership role in working with providers and patients to improve access to health care for people with disabilities. A social work framework of understanding the individual in a social environment may be the most appropriate perspective for creating innovative strategies for addressing the complex, multidimensional needs of people with disabilities who experience limited access to care.     

Not intruding,not colluding: process and practice in a contact centre

This article examines process and practice in a contact centre, with particular reference to the divorce/separation context. Against the legal, and emotional backdrop in which contact takes place, it examines the complex and varied roles which workers in this setting are called on to play, highlighting the skills and knowledge required for the intervention in this particular area of family support. It concludes by arguing that, if the rights and needs of children apart from a parent are to be promoted there are significant implications for training, supervision and support for contact centre staff so that they can not only respond purposefully to the families with whom they work but also manage the difficult feelings this area of practice evokes. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Professionals without a profession? Redesigning case management in Dutch local welfare agencies

This article explores the new roles of frontline workers in Dutch local welfare agencies against the background of recent active welfare state reforms, with a specific focus on frontline workers involved in activating social assistance recipients. The results presented in the article come from case studies in four local welfare agencies. The article investigates how active welfare state reforms have influenced the room for discretion of frontline workers, how discretion is managed in local welfare agencies, and how frontline workers cope with discretion. The article argues that the discretion of activation by frontline workers has increased significantly. The research results show a clear though not unambiguous shift from a bureaucratic towards a more professional treatment of frontline workers, combined with attempts to introduce a more performance oriented style of management. However, given the low level of institutionalisation of the profession of activation work, activation frontline workers still seem to be professionals without a profession. This not only makes activation work a rather individual project, it also entails risks for clients for whom activation services may become unpredictable and lacking in transparency.     

Vital tasks and roles of frontline workers facilitating job inclusion of vulnerable youth

Researchers and others are worried about the marginalization of vulnerable youth who drop out of school and work. Frontline workers are key support givers for vulnerable youth, but they have been described as professionals who lack a recognized body of knowledge they can rely on. This article investigates vital frontline roles and tasks related to job inclusion of vulnerable youth. Qualitative data are drawn from 16 Norwegian pilot projects aimed at developing social work approaches among vulnerable youth. The challenges and the support provided resemble those in other European countries. Cross-case analysis suggests four main support roles: (1) administration and securing of basic needs, (2) connection and relationship building, (3) job enabling, and (4) job customisation. Combining roles 1 and 2 with roles 3 or 4 seems to improve the outcomes, meaning that they improve the capabilities of vulnerable youth to find and master a job when that is something they have reason to value. Since this topic has been little explored for vulnerable youth, this article contributes to further developing job inclusion support for this target group in particular.     

Training together: An exploration of a shared learning approach to dual diagnosis training for specialist drugs workers and Approved Social Workers (ASWs)

This paper is the first of two linked articles exploring a shared learning approach to developing 'professional collaboration' as one way of improving care for people with complex inter-related mental health and substance misuse needs. The target groups for the training in this study are Approved Social Workers (ASWs) and specialist drugs workers. The article describes the social and professional contexts that shape the different training agendas for the respective groups of workers in an attempt to identify common themes that can be used as a foundation for developing training solutions. The relevance of a shared learning method of training delivery is critically discussed and the way in which this was adapted to respond to training needs identified in Birmingham is outlined. The paper concludes by suggesting that training providers should be encouraged to identify the common agenda for drugs workers and ASWs working with people with mental health and substance use needs and utilise a shared learning methodology to respond in a proactive way to improving service delivery through effective training. The second paper provides an in-depth exploration of the training delivered. Using a formative evaluation framework the paper reflects upon the methods employed to: ” identify curriculum content; ” promote collaborative working through different approaches to interprofessional learning; and ” demonstrate how the training is impacting on practice outcomes.     

My Life in Huddersfield: Supporting Young Asylum Seekers and Refugees to Record Their Experiences of Living in Huddersfield

A project was undertaken with the aim of developing resources that would improve service delivery to asylum seeker children and young people by improving social worker training within the new social work degree. Funding was acquired to work with a group of children and young people. The workers engaged with them in a range of activities, designed to enable the expression of feelings in relation to immigration and asylum seeking. Participants were told they would be working towards producing resources for the training of health and social care staff. This became a strong motivating factor in the engagement of the young people and resulted in the production of teaching resources and a number of changes to the degree curriculum at the University of Huddersfield.     

Workforce Issues in Residential Care Facilities in Rural China

This study examined contemporary frontline workforce issues related to residential care for elders in rural China. Residential facilities in rural China are in transition from exclusively providing shelter to childless elders to providing long-term care for frail elders. These facilities are also under pressure to improve the quality of services that they provide. The study is based on in-depth interviews with administrators and field observations of facilities. The study focused on the following issues related to the workforce: recruitment and retention, training, work environment, workforce organization, regulations, compensation, and career ladders. The implications of resident characteristics for demands on the work force were examined. The study found that lack of skilled personnel is one of the major reasons that the overwhelming majority of facilities deny admission to frail and demented elders. Improving workers’ skill is critical if these facilities are to meet the increasing demand for institutional long-term care needs.     

A recent look at the factors influencing workforce retention in public child welfare

Consistency of services to children and their families continues to be an ongoing problem in public child welfare agencies. Worker turnover is high, thus affecting the availability of a well trained, experienced workforce. It is critical that we continue to explore the factors associated with worker turnover and retention in public child welfare agencies. Such knowledge will allow us to determine the needs of workers, administrators, and the agency in general, in an effort to create an environment that will result in worker retention, and a better quality of services. Children and their families will be major benefactors of such knowledge as the consistency and quality of services will be enhanced. Existing research has found that outcomes for families and children are affected by the workload and training of frontline workers, and organizational characteristics (GAO, 2003, NASW, 2004, and Milner, 2003). This study describes personal and organizational factors relative to worker retention for public child welfare workers in the northwest corridor of Georgia.     

“Live Social Work”: How to Bring Life Back into Social Work

Abstract

In this article I discuss how professional social work can entail critical, reflexive work. This is accomplished by adapting the concept of “live sociology”. It is mainly an exploratory article, trying to raise suggestions that can be adopted and be further developed. I argue that people coming into contact with contemporary social work are sometimes reduced to being “dead” objects, as they are pinned down into static categories. The demand for developing evidence-based social work risks substantiating this tendency even further. In contrast, I claim that social work needs to move away from these kinds of explanations and instead turn towards developing “live social work”; that is to say, social work where everyday life, agency, and what people do in what context needs to be the focus, not what people are.     

Is Domestic Abuse an Adult Social Work Issue?

Within a global profession with a stated definition that includes ‘promoting social change and development, social cohesion and the empowerment and liberation of people’ (online), it would be expected that the issue of domestic abuse would be integral to the training and role of all social workers. This article reports on research, which highlighted both a lack of understanding of the role of adult social worker within cases of domestic abuse and also a desire for further training around the issue. However, this article sets out how the current UK (in particular, English) context of social work marginalises the issue of domestic abuse within practice with adults. This marginalisation has been achieved through the construction of domestic abuse as a children and families issue and limited duties, powers and resources within statutory work to support victims/survivors in their own right, rather than as ‘failing’ parents. However, the article argues that the role of social work education should be wider than teaching to the current policy or procedures and instead encourage a wider appreciation of the social, historical and political context. The article concludes with tentative suggestions for how domestic abuse could be considered within the social work curriculum for adult practitioners. This is in acknowledgement that social workers can be well positioned for the detection, investigation and support of those experiencing abuse.     

Working mothers,injury and embodied care work

In this article, we examine how mothers respond when injury interrupts maternal care, using the lens of embodied care, which we conceptualize as a form of ‘body work’. We draw on findings from a qualitative research project with two organizations in Australia that help people with injuries to return to work, examining the experiences of workers who are also mothers of dependent children. Mothers' inability to care for children during periods of injury was a significant concern for our interviewees; constraints on physical labour and physical affection were particularly troubling, indicating the importance of embodied maternal caregiving to maternal roles. Yet, while these mothers inhabited the spheres of paid work and unpaid care work simultaneously, service providers did not consider embodied care work or its relevance to injured women's ongoing needs for support. While our findings reflect the experiences of injured women, they also suggest the need for a materialist analysis of the ways that both paid work and care activities are deeply enmeshed in and through the bodies of those doing the work. Employers and service organizations still fail to recognize maternal ‘body work’, and this may be typical of social attitudes more widely.     

HIV/AIDS-Core competencies for practice: A framework for the education and training of social workers

This article identifies the increasing relevance of HIV and AIDS for social work practice in the 1990s and argues that the topic should be included as a core component of all DipSW qualifying programmes. It identifies direct work with people affected by the virus, health education and the politics of AIDS in relation to anti-discriminatory practice as key features of this training. The new educational-agency partnerships developing around DipSW are welcomed as having the potential to ensure a continuum of training for social workers. Local authorities, for instance, should have sufficient influence upon basic training to ensure that workers enter employment with a basic awareness of HIV and AIDS and the complex issues which it raises for practice generally. Agencies can then focus on planning effective training strategies which meet the specific and specialist needs of workers arising out of particular areas of practice.

The importance of maximising upon the symbiotic relationship between agencies and educational institutions is stressed, in order to ensure that the rhetoric of partnership is translated into action.     

Innovations in child protective services inservice training: commitment to excellence

The overwhelming obstacles to effective CPS intervention created by increasing reports of abuse and neglect, funding shortfalls, and the lack of qualified workers have prompted national efforts to reform the public child welfare system in the United States. Organizations such as the American Public Welfare Association, the Children's Defense Fund, the Child Welfare League of America, and the National Association of Social Workers are currently working closely with other national organizations to develop legislative proposals that will enable child welfare agencies to be more responsive to the needs of children and families. A critical component of this reform is the need to recruit, train, and retain qualified and competent CPS workers. The four training programs described in this article are examples of innovative programs seeking to enhance service delivery by enhancing the knowledge and skills of their staff members. Although the four programs were developed in very different political and social climates and within diverse organizational structures, they all provide useful lessons in how to develop efficient and effective training for workers delivering protective services for children. Any national, state, or local efforts to design and develop new CPS training programs should take into account the significant strides made by these agencies.     

The Problem of Pseudoscience in Social Work Continuing Education

The National Association of Social Workers requires social workers to obtain continuing education (CE) after they receive their social work degrees. A large and profitable industry that has emerged catering to this need for CE that is particularly focused on the needs of licensed social workers. Quality control mechanisms in place to monitor the content and delivery of CE approved by the field of social work is relatively lax, and as a result a considerable number of social work CE programs convey content that can be labeled as pseudoscientific. We provide illustrations of currently approved social work CE courses that provide training in a variety of bizarre and unsupported assessment methods and treatments that are pseudoscientific.     

The key role of social workers in promoting the well‐being of children in state care — a neglected dimension in reforming policies

Increasingly, policy measures are emerging at national or agency level in different countries to improve the lot of children in state care. Most of these rely heavily on social workers for their implementation. Yet the capacity of social workers to carry out such an ever increasing range of complex tasks seems never to be properly recognised as an issue. This paper argues, from an international perspective, that the continuing central role of social work in the lives of children in care merits much more emphasis in policy and service delivery. The nature of the increasing demands on social workers in this area of work are explored. Possible strategies to help build the capacity of social workers to respond to the needs of children in state care in the new millennium are discussed. Such capacity building necessitates government and agency initiatives to ensure realistic staffing levels, renewed training, and adequate support for social work services to children in state care. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

All Work and no Play? Understanding the Needs of Children with Caring Responsibilities

This article draws on research with children who provide care for parents with serious mental health problems and signals ongoing research that uses photographic participation methods with these groups of vulnerable children. The intention of this article is to highlight the need to move away from popular and simplistic representations of children with caring responsibilities (young carers) as victims of their parents’ illnesses, as ‘little angels’ whose caring work is condoned through rewards or as (exploited) informal domestic workers whose childhoods are inevitably compromised by the caring activity they undertake. Recommendations are made for generating deeper understanding about the lives and needs of children who are affected by parental impairment that is congruent with the thrust of current UK policy, Every Child Matters and the 2004 Children Act.     

Teaching and Providing Recovery-oriented Care Through Problem-posing Dialogue

As the recovery paradigm proliferates throughout systems of mental health care, social workers are being required to provide recovery-oriented services. Yet there has been little discussion about what changes need to be made in social work education to produce recovery-oriented social workers. This article uses Paulo Freire's theory of pedagogy to help social work educators understand how they can develop problem-posing relationships with their students in order to teach students about the relationships that social workers ought to have with people in recovery.