“We’re keeping everything together with Band-Aids”: a case study of care work and family violence during a US oil boom

2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (3) ◽  
pp. 395-411
Author(s):  
Elizabeth M. Legerski ◽  
Laura C. Hand
Keyword(s):  
Family Violence ◽  
Care Delivery ◽  
Work And Family ◽  
Care Work ◽  
Oil Boom ◽  
Care Workers ◽  
The Us ◽  
Domestic Violence Survivors ◽  
Depth Interviews

The Bakken region of the US recently experienced an oil boom, resulting in population growth and social change, including increased family violence. Drawing on care work literature, we ask: how might rural resource development impact the care work associated with services for domestic violence survivors? Utilising thematic analysis techniques, we examine data from in-depth interviews conducted with 50 care workers. We find that oil booms: (1) create more demand for care work; (2) lead to a scarcity of care workers; and (3) impact care delivery and burnout among care workers. Findings illustrate the importance of considering care as human infrastructure.

Working Conditions in Home Care: Negotiating Race and Class Boundaries in Gendered Work

1997 ◽  
Vol 27 (3) ◽  
pp. 479-499 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sheila M. Neysmith ◽  
Jane Aronson
Keyword(s):  
Home Care ◽  
Women Of Color ◽  
Care Work ◽  
Political Issues ◽  
Race And Class ◽  
Care Workers ◽  
Micro Level ◽  
Home Care Workers ◽  
Depth Interviews ◽  
Case Basis

Home care work in metropolitan areas is a source of employment for immigrant women of color. Service work of this type intertwines domestic and caring labor in ways that reinforce the historically gendered and racialized nature of the work. Such macro level economic and political issues are played out at the micro level of daily service provided within elderly clients' homes. A study of these processes in home care work was carried out in urban southern Ontario in two nonprofit home care agencies. In-depth interviews and focus groups held with visible minority home care workers suggested that workers deal daily with racist attitudes and behaviors from clients and their families; agencies recognize these oppressive processes but usually handle them on a case-by-case basis through supervisors; and home care workers handle racism on the job as they do in their off-work hours—by avoidance, situating incidents within an analysis of the circumstances of elderly clients, setting boundaries on discussions, and occasionally, confrontation.

scholarly journals GRANDPARENTING CHILDREN WITH DISABILITIES AND ITS IMPACT ON GRANDPARENT HEALTH

2019 ◽  
Vol 3 (Supplement_1) ◽  
pp. S628-S628
Author(s):  
Ynesse Abdul-Malak ◽  
Madonna Harrington Meyer
Keyword(s):  
Children With Disabilities ◽  
Routine Care ◽  
Life Course Perspective ◽  
Care Work ◽  
Negative Effects ◽  
Public Programs ◽  
Feeding Tubes ◽  
The Us ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Depth Interviews

Abstract Across the US, millions of grandparents are providing vital care for their grandchildren with disabilities when their adult children are in need of assistance and public programs do not provide needed supports. Research suggests the impact on grandparent physical health is mixed. This paper draws on in-depth interviews with 50 grandparents to explore how caring for grandchildren with disabilities shapes their physical wellbeing. We use life course perspective to assess the choices grandparents make from available resources and options at different stages of their lives and the effects on their health. We find in addition to providing routine care, helping with feeding, bathing, and dressing, some grandparents provide constant supervision and medically intense care, such as tending to feeding tubes, catheters, and oxygen lines. Many grandparents said care work has improved, or at least helped sustain, their overall level of fitness, while other grandparents find that care work has adverse impacts. Often there is too much chasing, bending, and lifting for their aging bodies. This paper suggests that stronger social programs for children with disabilities and the grandparents who step in to help them would decrease the negative effects of care work on grandparent health.

scholarly journals Technology Implementation in Elderly Care: Subject Positioning in Times of Transformation

2019 ◽  
Vol 38 (5-6) ◽  
pp. 628-649
Author(s):  
Beata Segercrantz ◽  
Maria Forss
Keyword(s):  
Technology Implementation ◽  
Elderly Care ◽  
Care Work ◽  
Innovation Implementation ◽  
Daily Work ◽  
Specific Effects ◽  
Care Workers ◽  
Semistructured Interviews ◽  
Subject Positioning

Innovation is often celebrated as a solution to various challenges in care work. Thus, a growing number of care workers are likely to experience innovations in their daily work. This article examines how care workers and project workers in elderly care are affected by contemporary transformations by exploring: (1) how they construct meanings around innovation implementation and (2) are subject positioned in relation to these meanings. Drawing on discourse analysis, we conduct a case study and analyze semistructured interviews, observations, and organizational documents. We illustrate how innovation is constructed in terms of optimism, and also as a source for struggle, with specific effects on care workers’ subject positioning. The findings thus contribute to new insights into the contemporary dominating discourse of innovation and its implications at the level of practice and subjectivity.

scholarly journals Interprofessional collaboration and barriers among health and social workers caring for older adults: a Philippine case study

2021 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
TJ Robinson T. Moncatar ◽  
Keiko Nakamura ◽  
Kathryn Lizbeth L. Siongco ◽  
Kaoruko Seino ◽  
Rebecca Carlson ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Service Delivery ◽  
Social Workers ◽  
Interprofessional Collaboration ◽  
Care Delivery ◽  
The Philippines ◽  
Geriatric Care ◽  
Care Providers ◽  
Care Workers

Abstract Background There is limited information on how the barriers to interprofessional collaboration (IPC) across various professionals, organizations, and care facilities influence the health and welfare of older adults. This study aimed to describe the status of IPC practices among health and social workers providing care for older adults in the Philippines; investigate the perceived barriers to its implementation and perceived effects on geriatric care; and identify possible solutions to address the barriers limiting collaborative practice. Methods A case study approach was utilized employing 12 semi-structured in-depth interviews and 29 focus group discussions with care workers from selected primary health care units, public and private hospitals, and nursing homes that are directly involved in geriatric care delivery in two cities in the Philippines. Overall, 174 health and social workers consented to participate in this study. All interviews were audio-recorded and transcribed verbatim. An inductive thematic analysis using NVivo 12® was used to identify and categorize relevant thematic codes. Results Interprofessional geriatric care provided by health and social workers was observed to be currently limited to ad hoc communications typically addressing only administrative concerns. This limitation is imposed by a confluence of barriers such as personal values and beliefs, organizational resource constraints, and a silo system care culture which practitioners say negatively influences care delivery. This in turn results in inability of care providers to access adequate care information, as well as delays and renders inaccessible available care provided to vulnerable older adults. Uncoordinated care of older adults also led to reported inefficient duplication and overlap of interventions. Conclusion Geriatric care workers fear such barriers may aggravate the increasing unmet needs of older adults. In order to address these potential negative outcomes, establishing a clear and committed system of governance that includes IPC is perceived as necessary to install a cohesive service delivery mechanism and provide holistic care for older adults. Future studies are needed to measure the effects of identified barriers on the potential of IPC to facilitate an integrated health and social service delivery system for the improvement of quality of life of older adults in the Philippines.

Exploring the Emergence of Self-Directed Home Care in Ontario: A Qualitative Case Study on Gotcare Services

2020 ◽  
Vol 33 (1) ◽  
pp. 28-36
Author(s):  
Margaret Jamieson ◽  
Anna Cooper Reed ◽  
Emma Amaral ◽  
Jill I. Cameron
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Home Care ◽  
Care Delivery ◽  
Standard Of Care ◽  
Care Recipient ◽  
Healthcare Sector ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Care Recipients ◽  
Care Workers

In Ontario, the number of older adults (≥65) is expected to increase from 2.4 million in 2017, to 4.6 million by 2046. This substantial increase necessitates a spectrum of care delivery options for older adults who wish to age in their homes. Self-directed care refers to a growing trend in healthcare that provides care recipients with more autonomy to determine what care they need, and how that care should be delivered. This research explores self-directed care in Ontario, Canada, examining an Ontario-based home care agency, Gotcare, as a case study. Semi-structured interviews were completed with eight of Gotcare’s care workers, three of their management team, and 11 home care experts from the healthcare sector. Analysis of these interviews generated four key themes: the circumstances under which self-directed care is an appropriate model for a care recipient; the experiences of home care workers offering self-directed care; the risks of self-directed care; and the opportunities of self-directed care. Findings suggest Gotcare’s model of self-directed home care is responding to a lack of home care options in Ontario, especially in rural and remote regions. The model should be seen as a viable option within the home care sector, but further research should be conducted to ensure that the highest standard of care is delivered to care recipients, and to inform evidence-based policy decisions.

Integrating work and home when patients are dying: a mixed-methods study of hospice care workers and work–family conflict in the US

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cindy L. Cain ◽  
Jack Lam
Keyword(s):  
Turnover Intention ◽  
Hospice Care ◽  
Work And Family ◽  
Work Family Conflict ◽  
Home Life ◽  
Home Based ◽  
Care Workers ◽  
The Us ◽  
Hospice Workers ◽  
Work Family

Scholars of work and family have argued that flexibility in hours and location may support integration between work and home. Home-based hospice care is a type of work that has a great deal of flexibility but it is not clear that it is used to support workers. Using interview and survey data from 179 US hospice workers, we show that the speeding up of care and culture of self-sacrifice make integration difficult. Almost a third of workers report that work takes too much time from home life, which is associated with higher turnover intention, higher burnout and lower life satisfaction.

scholarly journals The Regulation of Paid Care Workers’ Wages and Conditions in the Non-Profit Sector: A Toronto Case Study

2010 ◽  
Vol 65 (3) ◽  
pp. 380-399 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sara Charlesworth
Keyword(s):  
Social Services ◽  
New Public Management ◽  
Industrial Relations ◽  
Community Services ◽  
Care Work ◽  
Full Time ◽  
Non Profit ◽  
Care Workers ◽  
The Impact

This paper aims to contribute to understandings of the broader regulatory context in which remuneration for care work is negotiated and determined. It draws on a case study of the non-profit sector of Toronto and moves beyond an exclusive focus on the formal regulation of the employment relationship to include other crucial regulatory mechanisms in the analysis. The paper attempts to map the intersections between these different forms of regulation and to identify the effects they produce in practice.The paper identifies four main regulatory forces that shape the quantum and basis of the wages and non-wage benefits paid to care workers. Firstly, industrial relations regulation plays an important role not only through the demarcation between unionized and non-unionized agencies, but in demarcations between smaller and larger agencies, between full-time and part-time workers and between regular and elect-to work workers. Secondly, the sources and structure of the social services funding market directly limit care worker remuneration and can work to trump the impact of unionization. Thirdly, the regulatory force of the gendered undervaluing of paid care work is reflected in and intertwined with changes in the protection offered to employees via industrial regulation. Finally, the gendered architecture of paid care work, including size of agency or whether the care work is undertaken in the home or in an institution, contributes to different outcomes for different groups of workers undertaking similar work.The interaction of these regulatory forces plays out in the wage and non-wage outcomes in all social services work at the labour market, industry and workplace levels. While the non-profit sector in Toronto provides one specific context in which this occurs, these regulatory forces, particularly the normative effect of gender, are present in other provincial and national contexts. This is at least partly because the community services funding market in other developed countries is underpinned by the same features of new public management present in Canada.

Motivating Growth in Low-tech Manufacturing Industries

2019 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Naomi HERTZ
Keyword(s):  
Value Chain ◽  
Field Research ◽  
Sustainable Competitive Advantage ◽  
Manufacturing Plants ◽  
Footwear Industry ◽  
Technological Platform ◽  
Qualitative Methodologies ◽  
Developed World ◽  
Depth Interviews

Intensive manual labor enterprises in the developed world face challenges competing with products imported from countries where manufacturing costs are low. This reduces the volume of domestic production and leads to rapid loss of knowledge and experience in production processes. This study focuses on the Israeli footwear industry as a case study. Qualitative methodologies were applied, including in-depth interviews and field observations. A literature review on previous research, and contemporary trends was conducted. The field research examines challenges along the value chain in small factories. It finds that mass production paradigms impose a decentralized process between designers and manufacturers and therefore do not leverage local potential into a sustainable competitive advantage for small factories. The proposed solution is a digital and technological platform for small manufacturing plants. The platform mediates and designs the connections between production, technology, and design and enables the creation of a joint R&D system.

Care Work on the Front Lines

2020 ◽  
Vol 119 (820) ◽  
pp. 326-328
Author(s):  
Mary F. E. Ebeling
Keyword(s):  
Nurse Practitioners ◽  
Outpatient Care ◽  
Care Facility ◽  
Safety Net ◽  
Ethnographic Study ◽  
Care Work ◽  
Medical Professionals ◽  
Essential Work ◽  
Social Safety Net ◽  
The Us

An ethnographic study of the work of nurse practitioners at an outpatient care facility shows how these medical professionals must endlessly multitask to fill gaps in the US social safety net. In the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, a new focus on the essential work of nurses and the lack of resources with which they often contend is especially timely.

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