Social workers have a valuable role in society as they promote the development of new community resources that benefit clients including health-promoting activities. In order to promote healthy living, social workers must first understand what healthy living is in order to be an advocate for their clients. To assist in this, social workers could attend seminars on healthy living and gain the information they need to mentor their clients in certain areas of healthy living. Social workers could also refer clients to health-promoting classes such as classes on healthy cooking and hygiene classes. Healthy living involves ensuring that one can be an advocate for one’s own health and in order to do this, a client must be willing to express their own health concerns. Social workers can advise going to the doctor’s and seeking counseling so that a client can gain insight into their body and mind and what is best for them. Other health-promoting practices including providing assessment and referral to particular services that promote healthy living. Furthermore, social workers can identify resources that are not available in a community and help promote the idea of starting up …show more content…
It is important to educate our clients in all areas of illnesses including chronic illnesses and life-long illnesses. Too often, these resources are not available to our clients and we must first educate ourselves to help our clients. Understanding mental illness and treatments used to help alleviate the symptoms of a mental illness is also important to promote among clients, especially those within the mental health field because some of these clients may not have a support system who can help advocate for them. The ability to educate our own clients as to how substances can cause illnesses such as cancer and how to prevent these illnesses is a health-promoting activity that is important for our client’s overall quality of
Social work professions need to understand the importance of how individuals interact both with other people and their environment, to have an understanding how individuals are affected by these interactions (Rogers, p. 2). According to Rogers (2016), “Social workers are knowledgeable about human behavior across the life course; the range of social systems in which people live; and the ways social systems promote or deter people in maintaining or achieving health and well-being. Social workers apply theories and knowledge from the liberal arts to understand biological, social, cultural, psychological, and spiritual development (p. 2). Their work with clients begins with assessments to evaluations of intervention and is based in and supports of the core value system of the profession.
This is clearly a different approach from the other approaches that doctors and nurses take because it looks at the outside factors that can be affecting the person and not just looking at the person themselves. Social workers believe that by looking at a person’s environment, it can help with preparing or fixing issues that may come up. This is especially true in healthcare settings where looking at the kind of environment a person is living in can help social workers help make the patient’s life more comfortable (Borst, 2010). The strengths perspective focuses on the positive and essentially the strengths that a patient has to better help empower them (Borst, 2010). Social workers use the strengths perspective to do just that and actively look for patient strengths to better help empower the person. The healthcare setting itself is typically seen as a very negative thing. Many patients may feel like they are “broken”, and for many they may be currently at their lowest and don’t see the strengths they have (Borst, 2010). By doing this, social workers not only can help patients through a difficult time of health, but they do so by taking care of the social and emotional needs of the person while doctors and nurses focus on the biological (Borst, 2010). The strengths perspective also links back to the idea that social workers are a guide for people trying to navigate the
In this paper, the role of a social worker will be addressed. A Human Service professional has, in its hands, the responsibilities in the life of the clients and families they meet. The tremendous and arduous responsibilities they take on include, but are not limited to, the well-being and care of people and their communities. Such roles can be helping others manage the care of a family member, assisting individuals experiencing problems with family relations and conflicts, dealing with changes that come with growing old, aiding those suffering mental illness and or those individuals struggling with addictions. Briefly
Born May 18, 1915, Elman Rodgers Service is an American anthropologist theorist who created the typology now used to categorize Bands, Tribes, Chiefdoms, and States as societies. Elman Services’ classifications displays the social evolution of societies and are now the four levels of political organization. Service created seven characteristics in part with his four classifications of societies. Three of his characteristics are social structure, political system, and subsistence strategy.
Many individuals at some point during their lives require mental health services in order to enjoy life. Clinical social workers constitute the biggest group of mental health care workers who provide the majority of therapy and counseling services. For instance, professionals aid individuals to ascertain solutions to issues that fall along a continuum from the lack of independent living skills and capacity to cope with quotidian to severe depression and mental illness. Steve Taylor, Clinical Manager at Preferred Family Healthcare located in Trenton, Missouri. Now occupying a laudable position that inspires and encourages students to stay in college and work towards giving back to the community as a social worker. Taylor on many occasions explains the duties of his case managers in a simple but effective educational quote, “teach a man to fish and he will never go hungry, give him fish he will be hungry again.” Instead of doing everything for a person, you are teaching how to do for themselves; this is a very effective way to educate mental health individuals.
Clients, especially in the poorer and more vulnerable settings that social workers work in, are often unaware of their rights and the actions that they need to adopt in order to lead a healthier, safer life. This is where advocacy comes in where social workers make clients aware of their rights, responsibilities, and more 'enlightened' and healthier forms of conduct. In my case, this is Planned Parenthood where I teach a mother who already has many children how to prevent herself from having more; or I may teach an adolescent the rudiments of sex education and hand her contraceptives.
1999). This approach to healthcare is particularly challenging for social workers who help clients in ways that cannot easily be standardised, objectified and measured (Cullen 2012).
I aspire to become a licensed clinical social worker so that I can have an in-depth method for assisting clients. I believe that social workers are afforded an awesome yet overwhelming task of helping individuals through the course of their lives. I hope to inspire my clients in knowing that challenges are the stepping stones to becoming resilient and that challenges are not meant to break a person. All in all, it is important for social workers to constantly reaffirm their dedication to helping their clients by taking time to care for themselves, seeking continuing education so they are kept abreast of current information, realizing that the steps to change and change itself is often uneasy, messy, difficult but necessary for the advancement of all
This organization does not provide any information about evaluation studies or empirical research that shows their program design is effective
The profession of social work has been in the health care field ultimately since the beginning of the health care system. However, throughout the years, the roles of the social worker and their prevalence have changed just as much as the system itself.
According to NASW standards, advanced clinical practice competency in depression care for social workers requires that clinicians demonstrate knowledge and skill in assessing and managing symptoms, communicating with patients and families, and providing evidence-based interventions (NASW Standards for Clinical Social Work in Social Work Practice, 2005; NASW Standards for Social Work Practice in Health Care Settings, 2005).
Social workers observe first-hand the struggle the clients who lack the resources for maintaining the basic needs for themselves and their families face. As a future social worker, one would need to advocate for clients to receive access to social work services. Social workers will need to get the resources, work with other agencies whose responsibilities are to serve the needs of the population are ways to advocate for the rights of individuals. There are many of ways to advance, for communities and society as a whole social worker would need to advocate in another way. Through group advocacy and community organizing. As one people would come together and make up a plan of activities that address the social problems, improve services and enhance
Social workers have many different practices and approaches to draw on for work with individuals, families, communities and society as a whole. These approaches and techniques can be varied depending on the distinctive
In the field of social work, social workers work with a range of people from individuals, families, communities, and organizations. Social workers may face ethical issues in their work with their clients or working in policy practice for example. This paper will discuss social work ethics that relate to policy practice with using an example of an ethical standard of cultural competency and social diversity that is relative to a policy such as health care while discussing what ethical responsibilities a policy analyst are. In the field of social work, social workers work with various issues that can impact a range from individuals to families, to communities and organizations.
Social workers promote social justice and social change with and on behalf of clients. “Clients” is used inclusively to refer to individuals, families, groups, organizations, and communities. Social workers are sensitive to cultural and ethnic diversity and strive to end discrimination, oppression, poverty, and other forms of social injustice. These activities may be in the form of direct practice, community organizing, supervision, consultation administration, advocacy, social and political action, policy development and application, education, research and evaluation. Social workers seek to enhance the capacity of people to address their own needs. They also seek to promote the