Emotional Breakdown Case Study

Planning A Needs Assessment II

Student Name:

University:

Course:

Instructor:

Date:

Planning A Needs Assessment II

Resources Needed

Caregivers are often burdened by their work and may experience an emotional breakdown at times because of exhaustion, overworking, and busy schedules among others (Riffin et al., 2020). They lack time for their own needs and that is why a support group program or any program that assesses their needs and helps them to become better caregivers is important. To make a caregiver’s support group functional, both individual and community resources are required (Riffin et al., 2020). These resources may include human resources, such as several social workers to work with the members in the support group, a place or venue where the meetings will be taking place, finances either for transporting the members, paying for the venue, or even funding projects within the group, and buying refreshments for the group. Other resources such as writing or teaching materials are important resources for establishing a support group. This is because members of the group might need to write notes and the social workers also might want to expound on concepts they have discussed with their members.

The Program Activities

A support group has to be involved so that it can be more interesting and encouraging. For it to be involving it must have a set of activities that the caregivers can engage in. Some of these activities include starting by giving members good orientation and making them feel comfortable, and picking topics that caregivers suggest for discussion (Proctor, 2017). Other activities include engaging in dialogues by telling members to form groups for discussions, and creating time for the members to engage in outdoor games to free their minds and relax and be free from anxiety and stress. Also, creating schedules and time for speeches, allowing members to ask questions and be active participants in meetings. There are also extended activities like making the group public and recruiting more and more.

The Desired Outcomes

A support group is meant to offer support to a certain population. Focusing on caregivers the desired outcomes will largely depend on the situation and experiences of each member. Besides that, a support group is composed of members with commonalities and that attracts common desired outcomes. In the case of caregivers, some of the desired outcomes are; caregivers being able to adjust to the appropriate stress management and coping styles, know-how care for themselves first, both physically and mentally before going on with their duties, getting the caregivers to loosen up and be open and know-how and when to talk about issues before it affects them. In a support group for caregivers, the desired outcomes should be in line with the needs assessed before the group started (Tutty & Rothery, 2010). Also, another outcome that relates to individuals in the group is letting the members be encouraged on maintaining relations with other people that can help them have people close to them to talk to. The involvement of outside resources like state agencies for older adults would be important to relieve caregivers of some of their burdens like financial strain.

Plan for Gathering Information about the Population

The first step to gathering information from caregivers is to look where to find them. Caregivers mostly work in nursing homes and medical facilities where end-of-life care is involved in their programs. Secondly, the most convenient way of assessing their needs would be through qualitative methods such as questionnaires or interviews. These methods are important as a caregiver can get instant feedback on the needs of caregivers and make a link between common needs identified (Tutty & Rothery, 2010).

Justification of Plans and Decisions

For the program to be successful, caregivers have to make good utilization of the support resources that will be allocated to them. The caregivers will go through a 5-7 weeks training on emotional coping to avoid stress and anxiety, and how to maintain their general well-being. The needs of each caregiver will be documented and there will be psychoeducational lessons one day each week to particularly address the documented needs (Ducharme, 2014). In addition, a social worker will be making a connection with government agencies and community resources that are available for the caregivers. These may include housekeeping assistance and deliverance of cooked meals for their clients. When caregivers get this assistance they can have time for themselves to meet up with social workers and attend group meetings. If the caregivers find individual time to meet their social workers, then they can address their needs directly as they will have more free room to be open.

Conclusion

At the implementation stage of the program, social workers will assess the needs of each caregiver and their situation. Social workers need time to process the information given by the clients so that they can come up with better advice and solutions (Proctor, 2017). In the meantime, the group will be discussing general topics on caregiving. At the end of the training, a satisfaction survey will be conducted where members will be required to fi forms which will also be used to evaluate areas of improvement. There will also be a follow-up for a needs assessment to measure the effectiveness of the program and the costs incurred and other resources used. In evaluating the program’s success, the underlying factors such as the best clinical practices and positive observable changes in clients will be used. Also, attendance records can be used to evaluate the success of any program.

References

Ducharme, F. (2014). Psychoeducational interventions for family caregivers of seniors across their life trajectory: an evidence-based research program to inform clinical practice. Advances in Geriatrics, 2014.https://doi.org/10.1155/2014/316203.

Proctor E. (2017). The pursuit of quality for social work practice: Three generations and counting. Journal of the Society for Social Work and Research, 8(3), 335–353. https://doi.org/10.1086/693431

Riffin, C., Wolff, J. L., Estill, M., Prabhu, S., & Pillemer, K. A. (2020). Caregiver needs assessment in primary care: views of clinicians, staff, patients, and caregivers. Journal of the American Geriatrics Society, 68(6), 1262-1270. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/jgs.16401

Tutty, L. M., & Rothery, M. A. (2010). Needs assessments. In B. Thyer (Ed.), The Handbook of Social Work Research Methods (2nd ed., pp. 149–162). Sage Publications ltd.