Journal of social work in end-of-life & palliative care
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J Soc Work End Life Palliat Care · Jan 2007
Home and hospital; hospice and palliative care: how the environment impacts the social work role.
Social workers play key roles on interdisciplinary hospice teams and in hospitals on oncology or palliative care teams. Though palliative care settings include both home hospice and hospital-based consultation services, the different environments and scope of practice impact the role of the social worker. The purpose of this article is to examine the similarities and differences in coordination of care, teamwork, and collaboration in these two fields in order to highlight opportunities for enhancing clinical skills and developing our confidence and presence in asserting social work expertise with our transdisciplinary colleagues.
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J Soc Work End Life Palliat Care · Jan 2006
The role of social work in the ICU: reducing family distress and facilitating end-of-life decision-making.
The costs associated with Intensive Care Units (ICUs) are high and at times invasive ICU care may not be beneficial, particularly for those patients admitted to ICUs who have little hope of recovery. The process of clarifying medical goals for these patients is often facilitated by addressing psychosocial factors. ⋯ This can not only help improve quality of life for very sick and dying patients in the ICU and their families, but may also reduce the likelihood of decision-making conflicts from arising. Further studies need to be done to investigate the effectiveness of social work interventions in reducing family distress, avoiding care that is unwanted by patients, and demonstrating cost-saving benefits.
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J Soc Work End Life Palliat Care · Jan 2006
End-of-life care preferences of older adults and family members who care for them.
Using data from a series of in-depth semi-structured telephone interviews with family caregivers (N = 110), this study explored preferences for end-of-life care and the types of plans made. Caregivers provided rich descriptions of care receivers' perceived preferences for care at six weeks (post-patient discharge due to hip fracture or stroke), as well as their own preferences at one year and at five years. ⋯ A fourth theme, impact of the caregiving experience, also emerged from the caregivers' responses in terms of their own preferences for care. The findings are discussed in terms of the recently proposed national agenda for social work research in palliative and end-of-life care.
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This paper reports on the last of three National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization initiatives to move hospice and palliative care social workers into the patient/family outcomes arena: the development of the Social Work Assessment Tool. The experience of a team of practitioners and researchers is described, including results of two pilot studies and subsequent SWAT revisions. The major focus is on the current model performance improvement project, in which 19 social workers from 14 hospice and palliative care programs used the SWAT with 101 patients and 81 primary caregivers for a median of 44 days. ⋯ Qualitative interviewing of the social workers indicated some lack of readiness in the field to conduct quantitative outcomes measurement. Additional measures are needed in addition to the SWAT, including qualitative measures, and measures of mezzo and macro practice. Participants indicated that the SWAT was appropriate for use with economically and culturally diverse clients.
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J Soc Work End Life Palliat Care · Jan 2006
"They don't want to hear us": Hispanic elders and adult children speak about end-of-life planning.
This study used focus groups to understand Hispanic elders' and adult children's concerns about end-of-life planning. Ten older persons participated in the elders group, and ten adult children in a separate group. ⋯ Communication regarding end-of-life planning was of particular importance to both elders and adult children. The most striking indication of the challenges in communication about end-of-life issues is the insistence by both the elders and the adult children that their children/ parents do not want to have these discussions.