type:論文

type:Article

Development of a team-assessment support tool for social work clients experiencing complex problems is an idea that I conceived in the course of development research for the computerbased, multi-purpose support tool known as Ecoscanner, a project that I was concerned with as a member of an ecosystem theory study group. Ecoscanner was developed with the goal of realizing support tools for (1) social work practice, (2) encouraging people in need of help to participate in social work processes, (3) supervision, and (4) education. While I was working on simulation cases to be incorporated in the education support tool, or conducting interviews for developing the support tool applicable to psychiatric social work practice, the following two points attracted my attention. First, I noticed the pressing need for help in solving problems of client groups who have conventionally been referred to as "difficult cases" or "multi-problem families." Such clients have diverse and intricately intertwined problems. It is therefore extremely difficult to solve their problems using only existing social work programs or services. Nor can a single agency, institution or individual social workers offer sufficient help. Even collaboration with experts in nonsocial-work fields is not enough if the assistance relies on that resource alone. I termed the situations of the above-mentioned clients "high-risk client systems," which I define as (a) systems that involve multiple numbers of clients who have problems that affect individual clients interactively, and in which (b) more than one client lacks or has very limited decision-making capacity. Second, I noticed the fact that there are differences between social workers in the psychiatric field and other fields in terms of the points they identify as being important in addressing problems of high-risk client systems. When fields of specialty differ, perspectives on a problem may differ. I believe, however, that the issues social workers must address should be identical regardless of their field of specialty. It should be noted that successful support for high-risk client systems constitutes the peculiar task of social work and is even a raison d'etre of social work professions. In this study, the outcomes of research conducted on the basis of my findings are analyzed and organized for the purpose of use as a basic study for the development of a team assessment support tool, i.e., a means of enabling a team of social workers of various fields to help solve problems of high-risk client systems.

identifier:1

identifier:KJ00006129062