Will place-based leadership be the right remedy for health and social care?

This chapter explores the relationship between human rights and health and social care. It begins by setting out the main international mechanisms, at UN, EU and ECHR levels, and the obligations they place on governments. It then discusses the impact of international and domestic human rights instruments through an examination of developments in social care policy, and with regard to reproductive health care rights in Northern Ireland. It also highlights issues relating to devolution and the implementation of human rights in the UK and in particular the role of the Human Rights Act (1998).

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Health and social care workforce planning and development – an overview

International Journal of Health Care Quality Assurance ◽

10.1108/ijhcqa-05-2014-0062 ◽

2014 ◽

Vol 27 (7) ◽

pp. 562-572 ◽

Cited By ~ 8

Author(s):

Keith Hurst ◽

Deirdre Kelley Patterson

Keyword(s):

Social Care ◽

Workforce Planning ◽

Care Staff ◽

Staff Retention ◽

Policy And Practice ◽

Content Type ◽

The People ◽

Health And Social Care ◽

The Right ◽

Main Barrier

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to discuss the issues relating to getting the right health and social care staff with the right skills in the right place at the right time and at the right price. Design/methodology/approach – Key points arising from several master-classes with health and social care managers, supported by a literature review, generated remarkable insights into health and social care workforce planning and development (WP&D). Findings – Flawed methods and overwhelming data are major barriers to health and social care WP&D. Inefficient and ineffective WP&D policy and practice, therefore, may lead to inappropriate care teams, which in turn lead to sub-optimal and costly health and social care. Increasing health and social care demand and service re-design, as the population grows and ages, and services move from hospital to community, means that workforce planners face several challenges. Issues that drive and restrain their health and social care WP&D efforts are lucid and compelling, which leave planners in no doubt what is expected if they are to succeed and health and social care is to develop. One main barrier they face is that although WP&D definitions and models in the literature are logical, clear and effective, they are imperfect, so planners do not always have comprehensive tools or data to help them determine the ideal workforce. They face other barriers. First, WP&D can be fragmented and uni-disciplinary when modern health and social care is integrating. Second, recruitment and retention problems can easily stymie planners’ best endeavours because the people that services need (i.e. staff with the right skills), even if they exist, are not evenly distributed throughout the country. Practical implications – This paper underlines triangulated workforce demand and supply methods (described in the paper), which help planners to equalise workloads among disparate groups and isolated practitioners – an important job satisfaction and staff retention issue. Regular and systematic workforce reviews help planners to justify their staffing establishments; it seems vital, therefore, that they have robust methods and supporting data at their fingertips. Originality/value – This paper stock-takes the latest health and social care workforce planning and development issues.

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The development of safer walking technology: a review

Journal of Assistive Technologies ◽

10.1108/jat-07-2014-0017 ◽

2015 ◽

Vol 9 (2) ◽

pp. 100-115 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Esmé Wood ◽

Gillian Ward ◽

John Woolham

Keyword(s):

Decision Making ◽

Social Care ◽

Evidence Base ◽

Current Evidence ◽

Content Type ◽

People With Dementia ◽

Published Evidence ◽

Health And Social Care ◽

Current Evidence Base ◽

The Right

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to gain a greater understanding of the development of safer walking technology for people with dementia through contemporary literature. Design/methodology/approach – A two stage systematic approach to searching the literature was adopted. Initially this involved searching the literature to gain a broad overview of the development of safer walking technology and the context in which it has been developed. Then, this literature was examined in detail to look at published evidence surrounding the use of safer walking technology by people with dementia. These articles were quality appraised and a meta ethnographic approach taken to synthesis of the findings. Findings – There is a small but growing body of literature within this field. Whilst there is only limited evidence to support the use of safer walking technologies for people with dementia, the evidence to date indicates great potential for its use. If provided with the right support and guidance, safer walking technology has the potential to increase freedoms and independence for people with dementia; gaining them improved access to outdoor spaces and environments to support their health and wellbeing. However, if the safer walking technology continues to be associated with only risk management it will not achieve this potential. Research limitations/implications – The published literature within this field is small and has limited generalisability as much of it was generated in recent years has been by the same small research teams, often reusing data sets. There is also very little research that examines the experience of actually using safer walking technology and even less which explores the views of people with dementia. It is evident that a greater breadth and depth of knowledge is needed within this field to develop a clearer understanding of how this technology is used and perceived by all stakeholders concerned. In particular the literature would benefit from greater consideration of the views and experiences of people with dementia themselves. Practical implications – For many people with dementia, health and social care professionals can play an important role in ensuring appropriate assessment and support in the decision-making process when using safer walking technology. However, greater support is needed in decision making for all people with dementia, especially those people not currently engaged with specialist services. Therefore greater awareness of the benefits and limitations of this technology is needed by all health and social care professionals as well as the general public. Originality/value – At the time of conducting this review the author is unaware of any other systematic search of literature or overview of research on the use of safer walking technology and its use by people with dementia. Despite this safer walking technology is growing in popularity, commonly recommended by health and social care practitioners and often marketed and purchased directly by people with dementia and their families. This review offers an insight into the development of the technology and the current evidence base for its use.

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Information Challenges of the Deaf in their Health and Social Care Needs

Handbook of Research on ICTs for Human-Centered Healthcare and Social Care Services ◽

10.4018/978-1-4666-3986-7.ch005 ◽

2013 ◽

pp. 93-111

Author(s):

Cayley Guimarães ◽

Diego Roberto Antunes ◽

Laura Sánchez García ◽

Sueli Fernandes

Keyword(s):

Information And Communication Technologies ◽

Social Care ◽

Communication Technologies ◽

Care Needs ◽

Political Citizenship ◽

The Social ◽

Health And Social Care ◽

Information And Communication ◽

Life Threatening ◽

The Right

The members of the deaf communities have been excluded for many years from society and their own culture. Deaf culture is a term applied to the social movement that holds deafness to be a difference in human experience (which includes the right to use Sign Language) rather than a disability. The deaf suffer, daily, through life-threatening situations that go unattended, mostly due to lack of awareness, proper practices, and policies, among others. The Deaf are in dire need of acknowledgment of their plight, in particular by Health and Social Care practitioners, politicians, and researchers. This chapter calls attention to this minority and its needs, including social, political, citizenship, strategies, and polices dimensions. It presents a Human-Computer Interaction architecture with which to inform the design of Information and Communication Technologies to aid Health and Social Care professionals in their work with the deaf.

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Planning for tomorrow whilst living for today: the views of people with dementia and their families on advance care planning

International Psychogeriatrics ◽

10.1017/s1041610213001531 ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 25 (12) ◽

pp. 2011-2021 ◽

Cited By ~ 56

Author(s):

Claire Dickinson ◽

Claire Bamford ◽

Catherine Exley ◽

Charlotte Emmett ◽

Julian Hughes ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Advance Care Planning ◽

Social Care ◽

Evidence Base ◽

Care Planning ◽

Structured Interviews ◽

Care Plans ◽

People With Dementia ◽

Health And Social Care ◽

Advance Care ◽

The Right

ABSTRACTBackground:Advance care planning (ACP) is increasingly prominent in many countries; however, the evidence base for its acceptability and effectiveness is limited especially in conditions where cognition is impaired, as in dementia.Method:This qualitative study used semi-structured interviews with people with mild to moderate dementia (n = 17) and family carers (n = 29) to investigate their views about planning for their future generally and ACP specifically.Results:People with dementia and their families make a number of plans for the future. Most people undertook practical, personal, financial, and legal planning. However participants did not make formal advance care plans with the exception of appointing someone to manage their financial affairs. Five barriers to undertaking ACP were identified: lack of knowledge and awareness, difficulty in finding the right time, a preference for informal plans over written documentation, constraints on choice around future care, and lack of support to make choices about future healthcare.Conclusions:Health and social care professionals can build on people's preferences for informal planning by exploring the assumptions underlying them, providing information about the possible illness trajectory and discussing the options of care available. Health and social care professionals also have a role to play in highlighting the aspects of ACP which seem to be most relevant to the wishes and aspirations of people with dementia.

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