Spiritual needs often emerge in the context of receiving health or behavioral health services. Yet, despite the prevalence and salience of spiritual needs in service provision, clients often report their spiritual needs are inadequately addressed. In light of research suggesting that most social workers have received minimal training in…

Psychiatric advance directives (PADs) are legal documents that allow individuals to express their wishes for future psychiatric care and to authorize a legally appointed proxy to make decisions on their behalf during incapacitating crises. PADs are viewed as an alternative to the coercive interventions that sometimes accompany mental health crises…

Calls spiritual perspective important but relatively unexplored area in social work practice. Presents Jung's analytic psychology as theoretical framework for understanding spirituality within individual. Discusses practitioner's ability to conceptualize spirituality as construct that transcends religious or philosophical ideologies. (Author/NB)

Proposes advocacy role for social work in form of clinical activist model. Notes that, in this model, clinician's role is that of data gatherer and analyst, in addition to therapist. Sees client as centerpiece of change, revealing to clinician types of systemwide changes or reforms that are needed. Briefly discusses structural changes necessary to…

Examines orientation toward social work practice that places consumers at center of decision making/control. Examines trends in consumer movement, including advances among aging, disabled, and mental health client populations. Compares medical-rehabilitation and independent living models to demonstrate fundamental philosophical differences.…

Contends that metaphors can be used in psychotherapy with Latino clients through incorporation of dichos, or sayings, that exist in Mexican American and other Latino cultures. Sees dichos as offering clinicians culturally feasible tools for mitigating resistance, enhancing motivation, or reframing problems, and they provide an ambience that…

Reviews epidemiology of depression and ways this information can be useful for clinicians. Defines frequently used epidemiological terms; presents prevalence rates and risk factors; discusses impact and consequences of depression; and suggests arenas for prevention, early intervention, and treatment that can help clinicians in their everyday work.…

Describes how, through support of private philanthropy, welfare recipients have been involved in implementing welfare-to-work policy, including Job Opportunities in Business Sector provisions of Family Support Act, in Illinois since 1986. Describes client roles in problem formulation, model program development, policy development, and policy…

Notes that maps that have helped form worldviews of social workers and clients reflect ethnocentric biases that reinforce historic patterns of world dominance. Discusses ways for practitioners to recognize this subtle source of ethnocentric bias, which may affect their work with clients. Notes that understanding of these biases illuminates…

Describes several interviewing questions that a social worker can use to uncover client strengths related to the goals of clients. The questions include the "miracle" question, exception-finding questions, scaling questions, coping questions, and "what's better?" questions. Examines the fit between these questions and the key…

Examined the development and provision of social services to persons with Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) and their families in rural areas and barriers to the delivery of care. Subjects (N=15) were persons who coordinated or provided services to AIDS victims. Found structural factors, confidentiality, fear of contagion, and homophobia…

Describes study of representative case findings (N=100) in four social work programs which did not have in-house substance abuse treatment for indications whether the social worker had recognized substance abuse as a problem for the client or had made a referral for treatment. Findings suggest many clients were substance abusers, but few were…

Notes that since 1970, Volunteer Counseling Service of Rockland County, New York, has pioneered innovative use of community laypeople to do high-level counseling for clients with wide range of serious social problems. Gives the history and an overview of the mechanics and model of work that have made this agency feasible. (Author/NB)

Study of 298 U.S. social workers revealed that interest in international practice in developing world depended on freedom to relocate, expectation of rewarding experience overseas, possession of and desire to use requisite skills, interest in foreign intercultural arena, and global-mindedness. These variables, in combination, accounted for 41% of…

Conducted experiment and three replications in which focus of social work supervision was varied to compare client outcomes under two conditions (mixed focus on administration, training, and clinical consultation versus client-focused supervision). Adult outpatients reported significantly greater satisfaction under client-focused supervision.…