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Inconsistencies in the roles of family- and paid- carers in monitoring health issues in people with learning disabilities: some implications for the integration of health and social care
- Author:
- WILLIS Diane S.
- Journal article citation:
- British Journal of Learning Disabilities, 43(1), 2015, pp.24-31.
- Publisher:
- Wiley
Changes in the living circumstances of people with learning disabilities have seen responsibility for their health become the provenance of paid-and family-carers. As part of a larger study exploring breast cancer screening in women with learning disabilities, thirteen semi-structured interviews were conducted with three family-carers and ten paid-carers. Interview topics covered demographics, keeping healthy, the experience of breast screening and decision-making. Findings revealed that the role of these carers was undefined, leading to difficulty in deciphering who was responsible for the health care of the people they supported, with some paid-carers claiming that health was out of their remit. The difficulty of monitoring health problems of people with learning disabilities was noted, and carers disclosed skills and techniques that they used to explain health messages to individuals. If the health needs of people with learning disabilities are to be met, then a more consistent approach to health care within the community setting is needed, especially in terms of the remit of paid-and family-carers and with the integration of health and social services. (Publisher abstract)
Staying with people who slap us around: gender, juggling responsibilities and violence in paid (and unpaid) care work
- Author:
- BAINES Donna
- Journal article citation:
- Gender, Work and Organization, 13(2), March 2006, pp.129-151.
- Publisher:
- Blackwell
Little is actually known about women's occupational health, let alone how men and women may experience similar jobs and health risks differently. Drawing on data from a larger study of social service workers in Canada, this article examines four areas where gender is pivotal to the new ways of organizing caring labour, including the expansion of unpaid work and the use of personal resources to subsidize agency resources; gender-neutral violence; gender-specific violence and the juggling of home and work responsibilities. Collective assumptions and expectations about how men and women should perform care work result in men's partial insulation from the more intense forms of exploitation, stress and violence. This article looks at health risks, not merely as compensable occupational health concerns, but as avoidable products of forms of work organization that draw on notions of the endlessly stretchable capacity of women to provide care work in any context, including a context of violence. Indeed, the logic of women's elastic caring appear crucial to the survival of some agencies and the gender order in these workplaces.
Determining research questions on health risks by people with learning disabilities, carers and care-workers
- Authors:
- YOUNG Anita F., CHESSON Rosemary A.
- Journal article citation:
- British Journal of Learning Disabilities, 36(1), March 2008, pp.22-31.
- Publisher:
- Wiley
The authors describe the process by which research questions were developed for reducing health risks for people with learning disabilities. The study itself was undertaken in Aberdeen and Aberdeenshire. A participatory approach was used to give service users and carers a clear voice in deciding questions, thereby setting the research agenda. Audio-taped interviews and focus groups were used. Forty people (20 service users, 10 carers, 10 care-workers) were recruited and gave consent for interview. Interviews incorporated scenarios and these were used to describe two different types of health risks (i) those relating to lifestyle, and (ii) those associated with unrecognized illness. Participants were invited to specify a research question for each scenario. A total of 78 questions were identified, and from these, six key themes emerged. The themes were validated using three separate focus groups (service users, carers, care-workers). From this process six final questions encompassing participants’ key research concerns were produced. Questions were resubmitted to participants for prioritizing, using a postal voting system (75% response rate). The research clearly demonstrates that people with learning disabilities and carers can identify and prioritize research questions they consider significant for improving health.