Social work in health care
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Soc Work Health Care · Oct 2015
The Evolving Role of Geriatric Emergency Department Social Work in the Era of Health Care Reform.
In the era of Medicaid Redesign and the Affordable Care Act, the emergency department (ED) presents major opportunities for social workers to assume a leading role in the delivery of care. Through GEDI WISE-Geriatric Emergency Department Innovations in care through Workforce, Informatics and Structural Enhancements,-a unique multidisciplinary partnership made possible by an award from the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation, social workers in The Mount Sinai ED have successfully contributed to improvements in health outcomes and transitions for older adults receiving emergency care. This article will describe the pivotal and highly valued role of the ED social worker in contributing to the multidisciplinary accomplishments of GEDI WISE objectives in this new model of care.
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Soc Work Health Care · Jan 2015
ReviewLow health literacy and older adults: meanings, problems, and recommendations for social work.
Many older adults struggle to manage their health care problems. Low health literacy exacerbates such struggles and contributes to a variety of adverse health behaviors and outcomes. Addressing how health literacy impinges on the lives of older adults is a neglected area of social work practice and knowledge. This article explores seven areas: defining health literacy, the problem and prevalence of low health literacy among older adults, health inequalities and health literacy, a brief literature review, neglected issues in the literature, suggestions for macro and micro social work interventions to improve health literacy for older adult populations, and conclusion.
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Ethical decision making is critically important in hospice social work. Through in-depth interviews, researchers explored ethical dilemmas faced by 14 hospice social workers and the processes they used to move toward resolution. ⋯ Findings suggest that hospice teams should be provided with opportunities to meaningfully discuss ethical decision making. Further, the involvement of social workers in administrative leadership is recommended to increase the likelihood that discipline-specific perspectives are incorporated into formal policies and procedures that shape practice in ethically complex situations.
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Soc Work Health Care · Oct 2014
ReviewSocial work, technology, and ethical practices: a review and evaluation of the national association of social workers' technology standards.
Information and communication technologies (ICTs) are becoming essential to social work practice by providing increased treatment possibilities and reducing barriers to service. While recognizing the importance of ICTs in practice, social work practitioners have had concerns about ethical use. ⋯ While the guidelines set the groundwork, they were not embedded in a process that would allow them to adapt to the swift pace of ICT changes. This article reviews the current Standards, evaluates how these have been implemented by practitioners, and offers suggestions for updates.
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Soc Work Health Care · Oct 2014
Social media and social work education: understanding and dealing with the new digital world.
Accompanying the multiple benefits and innovations of social media are the complex ethical and pedagogical issues that challenge social work educators. Without a clear understanding of the blurred boundaries between public and private, the potentially limitless and unintended audiences, as well as the permanency of the information shared online, social work students who use social media can find themselves in difficult situations in their personal and professional lives. In this article, we present three scenarios that illustrate issues and complexities involving social media use by social work students, followed by a discussion and recommendations for social work educators.