Critical Hospital Social Work Practice
Critical Hospital Social Work Practice sheds light on the fast-paced, high pressure role of the hospital social worker. At a time of public concern over the state of the NHS and the needs of a growing older population, the hospital social workers job is more important than ever. Yet, it is poorly understood and often overlooked by policy makers, managers and other professionals.
Employing social theory to make sense of the contemporary context of health and social care, this book highlights the vital role played by social workers in planning complex hospital discharges. It provides an in-depth account of the activities of a typical hospital social work team in the UK, drawn from rigorous ethnographic fieldwork, and contrasts this with research evidence on hospital social work practices around the world. The author points towards exciting new directions for health-related social work and social works potential to develop critical gerontological practice.
This book will be useful to social work students and practitioners working in hospital settings and with older people in general. It will also be of significant value to policy makers and academics who are interested in developing innovative approaches to meeting the needs of the ageing population.
Daniel Burrows trained as a social worker at Cardiff University, where he and his future wife met. After seven years in practice, he moved over to teaching and completed his professional doctorate. He now lives in Cardiff with his wife and two sons and teaches on the MA Social Work at Cardiff University.
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Critical Hospital Social Work Practice
Daniel Burrows
For more information about this series, please visit: https://www.routledge.com/Routledge-Advances-in-Social-Work/book-series/RASW
First published 2020
by Routledge
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2020 Daniel Burrows
The right of Daniel Burrows to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
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British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Burrows, Daniel, author.
Title: Critical hospital social work practice / Daniel Burrows.
Description: Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon ; New York, NY : Routledge, 2020. | Series: Routledge advances in social work | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2019058405 (print) | LCCN 2019058406 (ebook) | ISBN 9780367203849 (hardback) | ISBN 9780429261213 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Medical social work--England.
Classification: LCC HV687.5.G7 B87 2020 (print) | LCC HV687.5.G7 (ebook) | DDC 362.1/0425--dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019058405
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019058406
ISBN: 978-0-367-20384-9 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-0-429-26121-3 (ebk)
Dedicated to the memory of Clive Burrows 22 January 1946 5 February 2000 and Roger Alexander 27 December 1948 15 October 2019
I am deeply grateful to the hospital social workers who were generous enough to allow me into their world and were so welcoming and friendly. When I finished the fieldwork, I left with deep admiration of their commitment to the well-being of the patients and carers with whom they work. My gratitude also extends to the clinicians and nurse managers who participated in my research with such friendliness and willingness, and to the patients and carers who did likewise.
I am much indebted to my two doctoral supervisors, Teresa de Villiers and Jonathan Scourfield, for their guidance and support. I must express my thanks to my wife, Hannah, for all the many ways she has supported me in this work and to our two boys, Frank and Wilfred, who have been an inspiration since their arrival, as well as a welcome antidote to the hard graft of academia. I am grateful for the support and encouragement of colleagues at Cardiff Met and Cardiff University and also wish to thank Geoff Underwood, Kris Ellis and David Mellor for the joy of their friendship. Finally, I must thank my mother, Diane Burrows, who has always supported me in pursuing my goals.
Preface
This book is concerned with statutory social work as it is practised by teams of hospital-based social workers employed by local authorities in hospitals all over the UK. Typically, these teams work almost exclusively with older people who are inpatients and who are unable to be discharged safely without social work services because of social care needs that have come to light since their admission. Hospital social workers are responsible for arranging services for such patients to be discharged as quickly as possible. This involves making an assessment of the patients needs, taking into account the views of the patient, clinicians and family members/carers, and producing a plan of services to enable the patient to be discharged safely from hospital. Typically, the care plan will arrange either for care services to come to the patients home or for the patient to go into residential care. The social care needs of patients usually arise from declining physical health, increasing physical disability and/or problems of cognition often related to dementia. Hospital social work is therefore characterised by short-term involvement with patients, whose cases are usually then passed on for review by community-based teams, and pressure from clinicians and hospital managers to deliver patient discharges as quickly as possible.
