Social care and health inequalities
Enable all children, young people and adults to maximise capabilities and have control
Adults
The term ‘co-production’ is increasingly being applied to new types of public service delivery in the UK, including new approaches to adult social care. It refers to active input by the people who use services, as well as – or instead of – those who have traditionally provided them. It emphasises that the people who use services have assets which can help to improve those services, rather than simply needs which must be met. These assets are not usually financial, but rather are the skills, expertise and mutual support that service users can contribute to effective public services.
SCIE Research briefing 20: The implementation of individual budget schemes in adult social care
This briefing examines some of the recent UK and international literature relating to the development of personal budget schemes for adults eligible for support from social care services. These include older people, people with physical or sensory disabilities, people with learning disabilities and people with mental health problems
SCIE Knowledge review 11: Supporting disabled parents with additional support needs
Disabled parents appear to be at disproportionate risk of experiencing socio-economic disadvantage and in particular poor long-term physical and mental health. This knowledge review contains good practice examples.
The term ‘autistic spectrum conditions’ (ASC) is used throughout this briefing to describe what were previously called autistic spectrum disorders (ASD) and is the one now preferred by the Department of Health in England. However, the term is seldom used in the scientific literature or in other countries and for this reason is potentially confusing and problematic.
Health and social care needs of refugees
SCIE Guide 37 Workforce development: Good practice in social care for refugees and asylum seekers
Refugees and asylum seekers often have complex health and social care needs including HIV and chronic illness, mental health and hardship. This briefing includes practice examples.
SCIE Race equality discussion paper 02: The social care needs of refugees and asylum seekers
People with social care needs are some of the most vulnerable people within refugee communities and their needs are frequently overlooked. This discussion paper attempts to describe the specific experiences of refugees and asylum seekers with social care needs. It also makes a series of recommendations for services to meet their needs more effectively.
Adults with learning disabilities
My LIFE programme: Assisting adults with learning disabilities to live independently
Young people with learning disabilities were able to develop independent living skills by working through a tailored training programme and putting their skills into practice by living in a training flat.
The My L.I.F.E programme has been designed to help people who use services gain the skills, knowledge and confidence to live independently and successfully and be able to sustain that independent life.
Concern has been expressed about the number of adults with learning disabilities receiving various forms of supported accommodation services. .
This knowledge review brings together knowledge from research and practice on commissioning person-centred, cost-effective, local support for people with learning disabilities who are labelled as having complex needs and/or challenging behaviour and who are living away from the communities to which they belong (i.e., are ‘placed out-of-area’).
Safeguarding and best practice in services for adults with learning disabilities
- To explore whether support staff share the same understandings of poor practice as people with learning disabilities using services
- To discover the extent to which support staff are able to acknowledge the impact of poor practice on people who use services.
- To identify any barriers which exist in relation to frontline staff reporting poor practice and abuse to the appropriate authorities.
See Project Outline.(From School for Social Care Research website).
Mental health
SCIE Research briefing 37: Mental health service transitions for young people
This briefing looks at recent research literature (since 2000) on the move from child and adolescent mental health services (CAMHS) to adults’ services for young people with psychological, emotional or behavioural problems, referred to as ‘mental health service transitions’. Young people may move to adult mental health services (AMHS) or need alternative support in young adulthood. Despite evidence of some promising and innovative practice, this is an issue of longstanding concern to young people, their families, practitioners and policy-makers, both in the UK and abroad.
Domestic violence
Empower Women and Providers: Domestic Violence and Mental Health
The project Empower Women and Providers: Domestic Violence and Mental Health is a Daphne EU-funded participatory action research aimed at supporting women who have experienced domestic violence and mental health difficulties towards improved wellbeing and control over their lives.
In parallel it also aimed at awareness raising, skills at identification of domestic violence and communicating with women who have experienced it, and changing attitudes towards them.
Prof. Shula Ramon. Anglia Ruskin University. (email Shula.Ramon@anglia.ac.uk)
Link: Empower Women and Providers: Domestic Violence and Mental Health
Person-centred support
Shaping Our Lives: Person-centred support: A service users’ guide
This guide will help you obtain useful information and practical advice about support services. It helps provide the picture for people who use services about what Personalisation will mean for them. What is more important is it will also help people to act on their rights as users of social care services.
This guide is a useful document for those working day-to-day with people who need support. It values practitioners’ perspectives and as both supportive and challenging. It offers practical pointers for person-centred support with being simplistic or prescriptive.
This is a useful and practical publication for anyone who is serious about running successful and accessible workshops and training. Its style is simple and clear.
This report shows how thinking in adult social care has changed. It documents a practical example of the development of personalised services involving the stakeholders with most to lose – people who use services and frontline practitioners
JRF’s report of the first phase of Standards We Expect ‘Personalisation’ of public services has become fashionable for politicians, policy-makers and providers. This research is a timely reminder that people who use services have long been arguing for, and designing, person-centred services. Change will only happen if services are shaped by the people who rely on them.
Older people
Talking Mats
Recent government guidance recommends that people with dementia are encouraged to express their views and be included in decisions about their care.
This study reveals how Talking Mats, a low-tech communication tool, can help both parties participate fully in discussions about everyday care:
Family carers reported that Talking Mats made them feel 'listened to' by the person with dementia. They also felt that their relative could actually 'see' their point of view when using Talking Mats.
Talking Mats can help people negotiate over day-to-day decisions.
The mats also offer a way for recording joint views to inform later decisions made with members of the wider support community.
Social work’s contribution to improving the quality of life and well being of older people living in residential care
The Social Work and Health Inequalities Network has worked with Leicester's Safeguarding Adults team to produce case examples of good practice in tackling health inequalities and improving social care outcomes. This example gives details of a nine month piece of work with residential care homes to improve the care delivered for older people.
Children and Young people
SCIE research briefing 9: preventing teenage pregnancy in looked after children
Teenagers who become parents are known to experience greater educational, health, social and economic difficulties than young people who are not parents. Looked after children and young people are at greater risk of early pregnancy and social disadvantage than other groups. The prevention of teenage pregnancy among looked after children and young people therefore poses particular problems and may have significant beneficial outcomes
SCIE Research briefing 37: Mental health service transitions for young people
This briefing looks at recent research literature on the move from child and adolescent mental health services (CAMHS) to adults’ services for young people with psychological, emotional or behavioural problems, referred to as ‘mental health service transitions’. Young people may move to adult mental health services (AMHS) or need alternative support in young adulthood. Despite evidence of some promising and innovative practice, this is an issue of longstanding concern to young people, their families, practitioners and policy-makers, both in the UK and abroad.
Still vulnerable: The impact of early childhood life experiences on adolescent suicide and accidental death
This study explores the impact of multiple adversity in childhood on suicide and accidental death in adolescents and young adults. The report, prepared for the Northern Ireland Commissioner for Children and Young People, argues for earlier, better co-ordinated and more sustained professional intervention in childhood to reduce the likelihood of poor mental and physical health, and compromised life circumstances, in later life.
Dr John Devaney, School of Sociology, Social Policy & Social Work, Queen's University, Belfast. (email: J.Devaney@qub.ac.uk)
Link: Still vulnerable report