Community Strategy in Response to People with Disability - Essay Example

Heading: complex work and development Your name: Course name: Professors’ name: Date Introduction Suffering is there, and nobody can deny this fact. Not everyone can meet their basic needs in life and still have extra resources to help them achieve their dreams. Community development organizations help these disadvantaged individual attain their dreams or at least have a descent lifestyle where there are able to meet their daily needs. The principle behind community development and work is collective empowerment where different people with different capacity are making decisions that are aimed at positively affecting the lives of others. Additionally, the scope of community work and development is very wide and includes providing better health care to the community, economic empowerment projects and education. These different scopes of community work and development have different issues which need to be tackled effectively and efficiently. The different models of community development and work include community care, community organization, community development, community education, community action; feminist community work and anti-racist community work and the strategy involved in each model differ. Therefore, this paper will discuss the issue of health care provision to the weak older people, mentally ill, those with disabilities and people with chronic ailments. Community strategy in response to people with disability People with disabilities, chronic illness, old and weak are faced with many challenges which make it hard for them to live independently in their home and to interact with members of the community without any prejudice. This group of people have complex and at times very hard to find needs, which without the assistance of somebody else it becomes very difficult for them. However, according to Møller & Huschka, (2008 pg 253), it was found out that this group of people have limited effect on household resources. Therefore, this group of people require the intervention of health practitioners and other stakeholders such as family members and the community in general to be interlinked together so that it is easy for them to meet their need without much assistance. More so, coming up with a framework that will ensure that they are independent should be the core thing for any social worker and other stakeholders involved. A case management framework ensures that all the needs of this group of disadvantaged people are met in a cost effective manner and effectively. By using case management a social worker is able to assess the situation and the needs of an individual client and plan what should be done based on the outcome of the assessment. Therefore, before going to the next step of facilitating on the need of the client, the social worker will have all the needed information to ensure that the client gets all the helps he needs (Case Management Society of Australia , 2009). Additionally, in case management a social worker is able to meet all the stakeholders involved through communication and resources that are readily available to help the client meet individualized health needs. There are various principle used in case managements to ensure that meeting the health needs of the individual is done effectively and efficiently. These principles include broker, clinical, strength-based, rehabilitation, assertive community treatment and intensive case management (Corrigan, et al. 2009 pg 141). The principle entailed in case management ensures that everybody in connection with the client is consulted before any action is taken (National Association of Social Workers, 1992). For example, a social worker should be able to contact the family members of the client or the guardian and also act as a link between them and the service provider. This framework does not go against the code of ethics as it ensures that confidentiality is maintained and cultural values are followed at all times (National Association of Social Workers, 1992). On the other hand, this framework is very effective in comparison to other service model as it ensures that there is continued care of the client and receives individualized care, thus offering both health and social needs to the individual. Furthermore, it is not centred on one system but a diverse of them with different work and service delivery structure for the benefit of the individual. As noted by Mizrahi (2008) to ensure that the above framework is successful, the social worker should formulate a technique that best helps in implementing an intervention model. There are various proposed techniques that help in facilitating a theory in order for him/her to come up with an effective and efficient intervention model. Some of the techniques that a social worker can use while assessing and planning the most effective intervention model include force field analysis, Delphi, Q-Sort, nominal group technique or program evaluation review technique (Pippard & Bjorklund, 2003). Each of the above techniques bring together are all the stakeholder involved so that they can brainstorm and come up with the best intervention model based on the client’s needs. In the case of helping people who are mentally ill, disabled, with chronic illness, weakly and old the best technique to use should be Delphi. Therefore, stakeholders in this field come up together so that they can be engaged in a group communication. The case manager should ensure that the discussion incorporates participation and empowerment (Kloos et.al, 2011). The group of stakeholders that should be involved in the group communication include clients, government, community workers, health practitioners, community and the carers. During the group discussion a questionnaire will be formulated and then given to the representative of each system. These will be a repeated cycle of scrutinizing on the answer and recommendation forwarded by each of the representative to the case managers until an agreeable intervention is reached at. However, to ensure that the conclusion of the group discussion was not biased the case managers to be used should not have any medical research background. On the other hand to ensure that case management strategy and framework will be effective, the group discussion will be divided into three different rounds each having a different set of question based on the response in the preceding round. In the first round, each representative present will be asked to give his/her views and recommendation on what is the best and necessary intervention method to use. At this stage, the number of methods to list is not limited. The essence of this strategy is to ensure that all stakeholders are involved in the decision making. After this round all the recorded interventions and views of the participants will be scrutinized to remove those that are similar and also categorized to small groups with major title and subtitles so that everybody’s views are well looked into (Matthew & Burns, 2000). In the second round, the reduced number of views will be provided to the participants and will rate them in a certain scale, listing them from which they consider more important to the ones they considered less important or urgent. Additionally, participant will not be limited at this stage and can add more views that they think should be included in the intervention methods. As earlier mentioned case management involves assessing, planning and facilitation to ensure that the clients receive an overall health and social need with ignoring any. The last round will be a comparison of what was rated by individual participant and what was rated in the second round, which will then be presented to the discussion group so that a comprehensive approach is attained (Matthew & Burns, 2000). The use of this social work and community development techniques ensures the case management framework is attained. This is because the social worker who had assessed the situation of the clients formulated the question based on the assessment done and the stakeholders involved come up with a plan and a facilitation method that worked well with everyone. On the other hand, the participant contribution ensured that the care programming of the social worker was minimized and also the cost reduced (Oeseburg, Wynia, Middel, & Reijneveld, 2009). Furthermore, through the use of this strategy every person involved gave their own views on the matter, which were weighted in a group of all the relevant stakeholders to ensure that each contribution was valued equally. Through the use of this technique a social worker is able to control the participant by ensuring that every one is involved in the decision making, thus avoiding the weakening or failing of the whole intervention method. As a result of using a case management framework and involving all the stakeholders involved, the social work will be able to maximally utilize all the available resources. This is so because, it customizes the needs of the client and marches them with the resource that are available and ensuring that the client receives the required services adequately. Furthermore, by utilizing the available resources the social worker is able to reduce the overreliance on funding from outside source by ensuring that the clients is independent (Zwarenstein, et al. 2011). Conclusion Case management framework acts as an interlink between different system, and therefore, it is able to facilitate quick admission to home care for those who are in need of it, thus ensuring the whole concept of community care is attained In the case of old or disabled, they opt to stay at their homes compared to home care. However, they are face with security threats and lack of confidence in themselves forcing them to go to home care. But in case management, these people are assured of security since there is always a person who is frequently monitoring them and confidence as there is a person always ready and will to pick their call anytime they call. On the part of technique used, the social worker was able to get a plan and a facilitation program that was practised based and workable to all since each stakeholder was involved in the decision making. References Case Management Society of Australia . (2009, June 12). What is Case Management? Retrieved may 20, 2012, from Case Management Society of Australia : http://www.cmsa.org.au/definition.html Corrigan, P. W., Mueser, K. T., Bond, G. R., Drake, R. E., & Solomon, P. ( 2009). Principles and Practice of Psychiatric Rehabilitation: An Empirical Approach. New York City: Guilford Press. Kloos, B., Hill, J., Dalton, J. H., Elias, M. J., Wandersman, A., & Thomas, E. (2011). Community Psychology: Linking Individuals and Communities. Connecticut: Cengage Learning . Matthew, F., & Burns, T. (2000, May n.d). A Delphi Approach to Describing Service Models of Community Mental Health Practice. Retrieved May 20, 2012, from psychiatryonline: http://ps.psychiatryonline.org/article.aspx?Volume=51&page=656&journalID=18 Mizrahi, T. (2008). Encyclopedia of Social Work, Volume 1. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Møller, V., & Huschka, D. (2008). Quality of Life and the Millennium Challenge: Advances in Quality-Of-Life Studies, Theory and Research. Berlin: Springer. national association of social workers. (1992, June n.d). NASW Standards for Social Work Case Management. Retrieved May 20, 2012, from national association of social workers: http://www.socialworkers.org/practice/standards/sw_case_mgmt.asp Oeseburg, B., Wynia, K., Middel, B., & Reijneveld, S. A. (2009). Effects of Case Management for Frail Older People or Those With Chronic Illness: A Systematic Review. Nursing Research vol 58 , 201-210. Pippard, J. L., & Bjorklund, R. W. (2003). Identifying Essential Techniques for Social Work Community Practice. Journal of Community Practice, Vol. 11 , 103-106. Zwarenstein, M., Reeves, S., Straus, S. E., Pinfold, P., & Goldman, J. (2011). The Cochrane Collaboration. Case management: effects on professional practice and health care outcomes (Protocol) vol 10 , 3-4. Read More