Malcolm Payne

Developments in end-of-life and palliative care social work International issues

English Palliative care social work has developed primarily as a specialist health-related form of clinical social work. However, the resource-intensive modernist medicalized practice of Western countries has been culturally inappropriate elsewhere. Broader end-of-life care and community education outside healthcare settings offers opportunities to develop palliative care social work in the direction of social development practice. French Le travail social de soin palliatif s’est au départ développé en tant que forme particulière de travail social clinique en relation avec la santé. Toutefois, la pratique médicalisée moderniste et intensément dotée en ressources des pays occidentaux, a parfois été culturellement inappropriée ailleurs. Plus largement le soin de fin de vie et l’éducation communautaire en dehors des dispositifs de soins de santé offrent des opportunités de développer le travail social de soin palliatif dans le sens des pratiques de développement social concernées. Spanish El trabajo social en el campo del cuidado paliativo se ha desarrollado primariamente como una especialidad del trabajo social clínico relacionado con la salud. Sin embargo, la práctica medicalizada y muy cara de las sociedades occidentales, no es apropiada culturalmente en otros lugares. Un cuidado al final de la vida más amplio, conectado a la educación de la comunidad, y al margen de las organizaciones médicas, ofrece oportunidades de desarrollar un trabajo social de cuidado paliativo que conduzca a una práctica de desarrollo social.

Why social work? Comparative perspectives on social issue and response formation

Why do societies develop social work as part of their social institutions ? From the perspective of western industrialized countries, this question seems almost luxuriously academic. Social work is a wellestablished profession: it seems a natural outgrowth of increasingly complex societies with their plethora of social problems. Taking a global perspective of current social changes, however, presents such a question as a serious and practical issue for at least three

St Christopher's and the Future

The founding vision of St Christophers Hospice was based on a recognition that permeating mainstream health care services would be essential and an emphasis on an adaptable philosophy rather than a building. Today, demographic and disease related changes mean that need and demand for end-of-life care will inevitably outstrip professional and financial resource. Hospices must engage with the development of cost-effective models of service delivery and rational planning. Only partnership working with the National Health Service, care homes, and others will ensure that appropriate care is available to everyone wherever the bed in which they die, regardless of diagnosis. Only collaboration and active engagement will ensure that future strategy in end-of-life care retains the original insight that its focus rightly includes not only patients but also the social context that will be affected by their death. Cost and patient choice dictate an emphasis on care at home. Health-promoting, public education and family-focused strategies will be essential. At a pivotal moment for the delivery of health care generally, hospices can play a vital part by marrying the role of “insistent conscience” of the health care service with continued cost-effective clinical innovation.

Adult protection cases in a hospice: an audit

An audit of the 12 adult protection cases arising in a south London hospice during 2004 is reported, including case studies illustrating issues arising and information about the introduction of a new policy and procedure following No Secrets guidance (Home Office/Department of Health, 2000). Introducing reporting to local authority social services and adult protection co‐ordination raised various issues.

DYING, DEATH AND GRIEF IN AN ONLINE UNIVERSE: FOR COUNSELORS AND EDUCATORS

Ten years ago, books on information technology were written for computer nerds. Now, practitioners in even the most interpersonal of specialist areas in counseling, psychology and social work, such as bereavement care, need to be able to respond to their clients’ and students’ engagement with an ‘‘online universe.’’ This edited collection of articles introduces a range of experiences in ‘‘thanatechnology,’’ mainly through examples of practice and online services. Although thanatology is usually conceived as an academic study of death, dying, and bereavement, the main focus of this book is on social support, counseling, and education in bereavement and grief. Material on practice in end-of-life and palliative care is very limited and increasingly important areas such as telecare and telemedicine are not covered. There are some useful resources on ethical practice in online counseling. The coverage is impressionistic rather than comprehensively researched. The authorship is wholly drawn from North America, a weakness when the internet is a global resource. The book is divided into four sections. The first consists of two chapters offering ideas to help readers orient their theoretical analysis in what may be an unfamiliar topic. They do not seek, however, to provide a coherent overview of the field of study. The second and most substantial section contains a good range of articles on online social networking as a form of support in grief and bereavement and covers, for example, social networking, blogging, and online communities of people sharing experiences of living with dying and grief because of bereavement, and memorialization on the internet. The third section more briefly reviews some experiences in death education and research. The fourth contains an article about ethical and consumer protection issues in online counseling and a consideration of issues for the future. Two of the more extensive chapters in Part II illustrate some of the rewards and weaknesses of the collection. The chapter on blogging swerves between introduction for the as yet unaware—the meaning of weblog, the diversity of blogs and bloggers illustrated by citation of Wikipedia and Google Journal of Technology in Human Services, 30:137–139, 2012 Copyright # Taylor & Francis Group, LLC ISSN: 1522-8835 print=1522-8991 online DOI: 10.1080/15228835.2012.701574