scholarly journals Spatial Analysis of the Availability of Health and Social Services for People with Special Needs

2021 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 442-452
Author(s):  
Patrycja Kabiesz ◽  
Joanna Bartnicka

Abstract The health care system should offer and provide a variety of services without undue delay. Due to numerous technical, financial and human resource constraints, not all services can be offered both without restrictions and in equal measure in places of different sizes of residence. As a result of qualitative and quantitative research, a map of accessibility to social and health services was drawn up, taking into consideration the division of the country into voivodeships with different population. Spatial analysis showed great diversity in terms of service availability. Voivodships with the highest accessibility of health and social services are Dolnośląskie, Opolskie and Świętokrzyskie, while the worst situation is in Wielkopolskie. Moreover, the article identifies the main problems that people with limited functionality encounter when using health and social services.

2021 ◽  
Vol 17 ◽  
pp. e3488
Author(s):  
Rosana Onocko-Campos ◽  
Larry Davidson ◽  
Manuel Desviat

The care of people with mental health problems requires health system and service reforms to build up proper mental health care. The challenges of the present moment continue to be immense. The viral pandemic that we are experiencing has exposed the fragility of our health and social services and certified the inequality and precariousness of the living conditions of many people. The collection of articles published in the journal Salud Colectiva as part of the open call for papers “Mental health and human rights: challenges for health services and communities,” includes articles from Spain, Brazil, Mexico, and Chile. These papers present conceptual experiences and reflections on community action plans and programs, contributing toward better knowledge and development of mental health in the region.


2020 ◽  
Vol 15 (3) ◽  
pp. 89-108
Author(s):  
Giulia Signorini ◽  
Nikolina Davidovic ◽  
Gwen Dieleman ◽  
Tomislav Franic ◽  
Jason Madan ◽  
...  

Purpose Young people transitioning from child to adult mental health services are frequently also known to social services, but the role of such services in this study and their interplay with mental healthcare system lacks evidence in the European panorama. This study aims to gather information on the characteristics and the involvement of social services supporting young people approaching transition. Design/methodology/approach A survey of 16 European Union countries was conducted. Country respondents, representing social services’ point of view, completed an ad hoc questionnaire. Information sought included details on social service availability and the characteristics of their interplay with mental health services. Findings Service availability ranges from a low of 3/100,000 social workers working with young people of transition age in Spain to a high 500/100,000 social workers in Poland, with heterogeneous involvement in youth health care. Community-based residential facilities and services for youth under custodial measures were the most commonly type of social service involved. In 80% of the surveyed countries, youth protection from abuse/neglect is overall regulated by national protocols or written agreements between mental health and social services, with the exception of Czech Republic and Greece, where poor or no protocols apply. Lack of connection between child and adult mental health services has been identified as the major obstacles to transition (93.8%), together with insufficient involvement of stakeholders throughout the process. Research limitations/implications Marked heterogeneity across countries may suggest weaknesses in youth mental health policy-making at the European level. Greater inclusion of relevant stakeholders is needed to inform the development and implementation of person-centered health-care models. Disconnection between child and adult mental health services is widely recognized in the social services arena as the major barrier faced by young service users in transition; this “outside” perspective provides further support for an urgent re-configuration of services and the need to address unaligned working practices and service cultures. Originality/value This is the first survey gathering information on social service provision at the time of mental health services transition at a European level; its findings may help to inform services to offer a better coordinated social health care for young people with mental health disorders.


1985 ◽  
Vol 56 (3) ◽  
pp. 889-890
Author(s):  
Chris Phillipson ◽  
Patricia Strang

In the present study a sentence completion list was administered to a range of community carers in the health and social services. Analysis of information from 334 respondents indicated statistically significant differences regarding perceptions about older people. The responses of the different groups indicated attitudinal support for developing a range of preventive strategies in the field of social and health care. There was some evidence, however, that workers held stereotyped views about the lives of older people.


2020 ◽  
Vol 38 (1) ◽  
pp. 12-18
Author(s):  
Jacob D. Hill ◽  
Allison M. Cuthel ◽  
Corita R. Grudzen

Objectives: The objective of this study is to identify contextual access factors to home and community health services for end-of-life support for older adults with serious life-limiting illness, as well as determine if access to home and community services is associated with health-care utilization. Design: This study includes an environmental scan, grey literature review, qualitative interviews, and health-care utilization analysis. This study is a subproject of the Grudzen et al. Primary Palliative Care for Emergency Medicine (PRIM-ER) study. Settings/Location: Analysis will include data collection from 17 health systems implementing the PRIM-ER intervention. Participants: For the qualitative interviews, one emergency medicine (EM) physician and one EM nurse will be interviewed from each of the 17 participating health systems. For the health-care utilization analysis, we will use the Senior Care Services Scale (SCSS), American Hospital Association Annual Survey of Hospitals (AHA-ASH), and Medicare claims for all emergency department (ED) visits for serious illness who present at each participating health system. Outcome Measures: The contextual analysis will obtain data on home and community services, such as hospice, home health services, assisted living, integrative medicine services, etc., available around each health system’s highest volume ED, federal and state regulations influencing access to services, as well as EM provider perspectives on access to services. The health-care utilization analysis will determine if SCSS scores, which measure service availability, are associated with health-care usage. High or low SCSS scores are determined by comparing health system service availability on the AHA-ASH to the national median SCSS value.


2012 ◽  
Vol 49 (2) ◽  
pp. 261-282 ◽  
Author(s):  
Simon Corneau ◽  
Vicky Stergiopoulos

Anti-racism and anti-oppression frameworks of practice are being increasingly advocated for in efforts to address racism and oppression embedded in mental health and social services, and to help reduce their impact on mental health and clinical outcomes. This literature review summarizes how these two philosophies of practice are conceptualized and the strategies used within these frameworks as they are applied to service provision toward racialized groups. The strategies identified can be grouped in seven main categories: empowerment, education, alliance building, language, alternative healing strategies, advocacy, social justice/activism, and fostering reflexivity. Although anti-racism and anti-oppression frameworks have limitations, they may offer useful approaches to service delivery and would benefit from further study.


1986 ◽  
Vol 10 (10) ◽  
pp. 293
Author(s):  
Elizabeth Garrett

ESCATA, the enterprising and innovative organisation which specialises in training material for health and social services professionals, does not claim mainly to produce educational films but rather, what it terms ‘video assisted workshops’. This is an important distinction and should be borne in mind when viewing the ‘Tread Softly’ video which looks at the transition from large psychiatric hospitals to local community services and is intended for practitioners, planners, managers and members from both voluntary and statutory mental health services.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ruta Valaitis ◽  
Laura Cleghorn ◽  
Ivaylo Vassilev ◽  
Anne Rogers ◽  
Jenny Ploeg ◽  
...  

BACKGROUND Primary care providers have been tasked with fostering self-management through managing referrals and linking patients to community-based health and social services. This study evaluated a web-based tool –GENIE (Generating Engagement in Network InvolvEment)– as a component of the Health TAPESTRY program to support self-management of older adults who are high health care system users. GENIE aims to empower patients to leverage their personal social networks to access community services towards reaching their health goals. GENIE maps client’s personal networks, elicits preferences, and filters local health and social resources from a community service directory based on results of a questionnaire that explores client’s interests. In the Health TAPESTRY program, volunteers conducted home visits to gather health information on tablets and implemented the GENIE tool. A report was generated for the primary care team for follow up. OBJECTIVE This study examined the usability, feasibility, and perceived outcomes of the implementation of GENIE with older adults who were enrolled in Ontario’s Health Links Program, which coordinates care for the highest users of the health care system. METHODS This study involved two primary care clinician focus groups, one clinician interview, a volunteer focus group, client telephone interviews, field observations, and GENIE utilization statistics. RESULTS Eight patients, three volunteers, and 16 primary care clinicians participated. Patients were most interested in services that were health-related (exercise and socialization). Overall, participants perceived GENIE to be useful and easy to use, despite challenges related to email set up, disease terminology, instructions for personal network mapping, and clarity of questionnaire items. Volunteer facilitation was critical to support implementation of Genie. Tool completion averaged 39 minutes. Almost all patients identified a community program or activity of interest using GENIE. Half followed up on health and social services and added new members to their network over 6 months, while one participant lost a member. Clinicians had concerns about accuracy, suitability, and quantity of suggested programs and services generated from the tool and believed that they could better tailor choices for their patients highlighting the inherent tension between user-centred preferences focused on capabilities and bio-medical definitions of need shaping professional judgement. However, clinicians did note that GENIE strengthened their understanding of patients’ personal social networks. CONCLUSIONS This study demonstrated GENIE’s potential, facilitated by volunteers, to expand patients’ social networks and link them to relevant health and social services to support self-management. Volunteers require training to effectively implement GENIE for self-management support and can help overcome time limitations that primary care clinicians face. Refining the filtering capability of GENIE to allow for better tailoring of results to address the complex needs of those who are high system users may help to improve primary care provider’s confidence in such tools. CLINICALTRIAL Not applicable


2013 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 53 ◽  
Author(s):  
Donna L. M. Kurtz ◽  
Jessie C. Nyberg ◽  
Susan Van Den Tillaart ◽  
Buffy Mills ◽  
The Okanagan Urban Aboriginal Health Res (OUAHRC)

This article reports some of the preliminary findings of an ongoing participatory research study exploring the provision of health and social services for urban Aboriginal communities in the Okanagan Valley. In particular, the article examines how colonial structures and systems have worked to silence Aboriginal women’s voices and how this has affected the ways in which urban Aboriginal women seek out health services. The article addresses these issues through the voices of the Aboriginal women in the study. The women’s stories reveal the many assumptions and inequities that contribute to their marginalization. They describe how their voices are often silenced when they access health services and how this can cause them to either delay seeking needed health advice or accept the status quo. The women’s stories are used to stress the importance and power of voice. This is most evident in their experiences accessing the health services offered through community-based Friendship Centres, where many felt they had more control over the care they received. In the context of this article, the impacts of colonization and the silencing of women’s voices are viewed as acts of structural violence. The women’s stories provide crucial insights into how health care provision can be changed to help prevent these acts of violence, thus leading the way to improved health for all urban Aboriginal populations.


1969 ◽  
Vol 115 (522) ◽  
pp. 605-611 ◽  

The Royal Medico-Psychological Association has given its general support to the unification implied in the Green Paper on the Administrative Structure of the Medical and Related Services in England and Wales. This document specifically states that ‘the effective development of comprehensive services for them (categories including the mentally disordered) requires that all aspects of their health care should be the responsibility of a single authority’. In our Memorandum on this subject we stated ‘we accept the need for a single authority in each area to coordinate the wide range of health services, to plan the use of related services, and to apportion resources between care in the community and hospital care’.


2004 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-25
Author(s):  
Imran Ashraf Toor ◽  
Muhammad Sabihuddin Butt

For the provision of better social services, the health sector has been an important part of national strategy for reducing poverty and income disparities among different income groups in Pakistan. The distribution of access to and use of health among households has been a long-standing concern among policy makers. In this study, government health expenditure is treated as a fixed factor that influences household health behaviour, conditional on such factors as household income, education, and family size. The results of the study suggest that government health expenditure is associated with higher use of both preventive and curative health services by children. The results also indicate that increased government expenditure is actually associated with lower use of health services by the children of the poor, although this negative association is generally weak. However, if increased government spending improves health care opportunities for the nonpoor more than for the poor, the total effect of government spending on the health outcomes of the poor could be less even though they have a higher marginal product of health care inputs.


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