PRACTICE INTEGRATION PAPER (10 pages-not including references or appendices)

Neuro-Psychologists at my field placement provides assessment and diagnosis of memory loss, individualize care plans with treatment recommendations, outreach to primary care and other healthcare professionals and information about clinical trials. My job as an intern is basically to initiate the intake assessment on the phone and set up appointments. When the patient comes in, I sit and observe a 20-minute MOCA test given by the social worker and patient continues the remainder of the visit with the neuro-psychologist.

For this paper, discuss your theoretical or conceptual approach to practice and analyze your work with one client. 86 years old female diagnosed with early stage Alzheimer’s disease brought in by family. Family complained of symptoms of forgetfulness, increased anxiety, lack of interest, poor ADLs.

It is critical that you identify what you did and why, what worked and what you would do differently next time.(You can create you own communication given the client about)

Your conceptualization and analysis of your work must be supported with relevant literature (10 articles Peer reviewed not older than 10 years, or book chapters) and examples from case material.

Course Texts:

LeCroy, W. (2014). Case studies in social work practice (3rd ed.). Hoboken, NJ: Wiley & Sons.

Shulman, L. (2016). The skills of helping individuals, families, groups, and communities (8th ed.). Boston,MA

The evaluation of this paper will be based on the ability to critically analyze social work practice and to integrate theory and practice.

Some points or issues you should consider are identified below. You can provide any additional material regarding dominant theoretical perspectives and service modalities endorsed by such agency and whether your conceptual approach to practice is consistent with that of that agency.

I.Introduction

II.Theoretical approach to practice

• Discuss the theory guiding your work and draw from the literature to determine how the theory is supported for your particular client problem or population.

III.Case presentation

A.Referral- To a Neuro-psychologist

B. Presenting concerns- Cognitive impairment, forgetfulness, memory problems

• Describe the issues that led the client to the agency-forgetting their children’s names and ADL’s
• What were the client’s circumstances at the time of referral? forgetting their children’s names, ADL’s, anxiety etc.
• How did the client identify the need (or requirement) for services? The client is growing in frustration, but the primary doctor and daughter identified the need for evaluation.

IV.Assessment

• Summarize your assessment, conclusions and the problems for work, you and the client identified. Increase memory, wants to be less frustrated, wants to gain independence again.

• Discuss any discrepancies between your views of the problems for work and those of the client. The client feels more independent than they actually are.
• The assessment should include a biopsychosocial assessment or mental status exam as an appendix.
• The assessment should conclude with a formulation which is a summary of possible factors (psychological, social, environmental, biological, developmental, political) that have caused or influenced the client’s present situation. What are all the local , interpersonal, family, and societal factors that led to the client’s issue.
• The formulation includes hypotheses about how the client has come to this point in his/her life, and it notes some of the themes or threads that you and the client have identified.
• It incorporates both the strengths and the problems presented by the client and the situation, and it forms the basis of the next steps, that is, determining goals for the work you and the client will be doing together and the contract about how the work will be done to reach those goals.

V.Relationship with the client

A.Engagement

• How did you engage with this client?
• Did you encounter any resistance or obstacles? How did you handle this?

B. Contracting

• Describe the process
• Identify the tasks you and the client worked on.
• Support your choice of strategies by referring to relevant theory/research.

C.Issues of diversity/difference-In what ways were you similar or different from the client?

How did you address these differences?

VI.Intervention

VII.Ethical issues

Did you encounter any issues and if not, determine what potential ethical issues you might encounter in the future?

VIII.Constraints/limitations

• Discuss any constraints or limitations you encountered in working with this client.
• How did they affect your work?
• How could they be addressed or avoided?

IX.Conclusion

• Discussion of research to support the case approach to practice with this client and self-reflections for your practice.

X.References

Writing Expectations: Papers should conform to college standards of written English. Written work should be typed, neatly and carefully formatted, proofread, checked for proper grammar and spelling, well-organized, and properly referenced using the APA 6th Edition Citation Style. Points will be deducted for weak organization, poor spelling, poor grammar, and noncompliance with APA.