Vulnerable Adults Essay Example for Free

Vulnerable Adults Essay Introduction Health service is defined as a top most service that is related to the diagnosis and treatment of disease, or the promotion, maintenance and restoration of health (Capezuti, Siegler and Mezey, 2007). There are personal and non personal health services. In UK, National Health Service (NHS) launched in the year 1948. Now it is the world’s largest publically funded health service. The health service in NHS is adorned with efficiency and comprehensive to provide maximum help and support for the needed people. Social care is defined as a profession where people work in partnership with those who experience marginalisation or disadvantage or who needs special care and support, vulnerable people leaving in the community and in the residential care ( Miller, Vandome and McBrewster, 2009). The policies and the legislations for support the caring and supporting the elder people are very important and it should be cared by each health professionals and by the society (http://www.dh.gov.uk/en/socialcare/index.htm). Care quality commission provides the assurance for the quality of care and support for the residence in the care homes residential homes with the support of policies and legislations in the England. The aim of this essay is to identify the law that is related to vulnerable adults is the lack of resources. Literature review In definition, a vulnerable adult is a person aged over the sixteen and not able to protect or take care of himself. There are number of reasons behind it; they are illness, physical disability, mental illness, drug or alcohol dependency and old age. The children act 1989 offer social workers and local authorities a clear legal framework to go along with their duties and obligations. This act is to provide maximum help and support for the children with its significant resources. This act got passed on the basis of simplifying the child care legislation that is exciting (Gupta, Playfer and Bhowmick, 2008). However, it is clear that for vulnerable adults it is difficult to find out a unifying statue, but instead there is some fragmented legislation that is difficult to locate and implement in an effective way. As the reason for a social worker and other care provider it is difficult to carry their skill, knowledge, experience and sensitivity for the support of the vulnerable adults. In this particular area, mental health legislation and community care lead the provision of services offering some regulations and guidance. But there are some confusion can be found out these regulations and guidance for the health providers. As the result it is a confused area to provide the needed duties and obligations from the part of the care providers. It is clear that there are some specific written policies to support the vulnerable adults, however with the involvement of different agencies in the protection of vulnerable adults it is still in confusion thinking that who is the right responsible to provide help and support. To rectify all these problems, NHS trust, social service department and all other related health services organisation should work together for a better result. But unfortunately th is is not the case. Care in the community According to the Health and Social Care Bill 2011, it gives an importance to the care , general health and other social issues. The social issues and care is very important and it should be cared by the medical professionals and other publics. The care and support for the adults in the society is very important and it should be valued for each and every persons especially by the health professionals. The Health and Social Care Bill was introduced in 19 January in 2011 in the parliament and the major part of this include with the modernisation in the medical facilities and world class health care delivering by the health professionals. The caring of the adults is very important and it also very important to give the modern and effective facilities to the adults and the other public (http://www.info4local.gov.uk/documents/related-links/1820651). The community care is aimed to offer help and support for both the vulnerable adult and their carer. The first step is to provide help for vulnerable adults is the recognition of him. Since the lacking of collaboration with multi agency and resources in majority of the local authorities and primary care trusts it would be unrecognised with the arrangements or referrals for the assessments related to needs (Baggett, 1989). This problem takes place with the lack of information and knowledge of the care providers since they are lacking of knowledge with the present legislation. It leads to more spending and needless action to provide maximum help and support for the vulnerable adults in the needed time. Most of the vulnerable adults are unaware of the help that is to be provided; there should be an immediate action to prevent this situation from worsening. Most of the adults are too proud seeking their help and needs from the care providers (Backhaus, 2011). For example, the visitors of the adults in hospital give the more support to offer help and support from the care providers. But there are some adults those who are avoided especially in majority of situation and their condition is getting worsening. Section 46 of the National Health Service and community care act 1990 defines the care plans and services to be provided for the needed people. It includes with laundry services, meals on wheels, residential care and social work. This section is a leading one to uplift the quality of care provider to maintain his service and help for the needed people. According to the local authorities the meaning of need because of financial constraints it guides to procedural bias and restriction of services. It clearly defines that the lack of resources with the law related to vulnerable adults and this area needed a special care. Old age According to the ‘Promoting Health and Well Being’ that is a standard which used by the national service frame work in Wales, they care about the older people and they gives some guidelines and the standard line for the old age lives. The major points which include with this are strategy for the nutrition and the well being of the older people, active and healthy life style of the people who lived in Wales, frame works for actions and National service frame work for diabetes, mental health and coronary heart diseases (http://cymru.gov.uk/topics/olderpeople/health/?skip=1lang=en). In old age a person comes in to the position of vulnerability with the reasons of not been provided adequate services and help or being a victim of some kind of abuse or neglect. As far as the duty of a social worker is concerned with old people, there should be some kind of a special treating on the basis of respect to provide maximum help and support for the old age people. Their voice should be valuable and heard with its prior important. On the basis of human rights 1998, a social worker should respect the human rights of adults, right to privacy, right to liberty and right to fair trial. A social worker should be friendly and can work in partnership with service user to make eligible the service users to be feeling as comfortable and supported (Duquenoy, George and Kimppa, 2008). Their needs skills and professional judgement from the part of the social worker to provide the needs of the adults and also to protect them. Since there are no laws to old people but for children, child act 1989, a social worker should be capable of with the legislation from different areas to offer the better results for the service users. In clear words, if a social worker is trained with specialist knowledge he becomes more positive to offer his better result. It is unmistakably true that the availability of the resources in the local authority plays and important impact to provide support and care for the old people and it is different in regions (Kamp and Hvid, 2012). It shows that it takes place with the lacking of proper application of the law. For example, the health services and public health act 1968, (HSPHA)’s state that the local authority may take arrangements to offer some services that is based on the well fare of older people. This wording act can’t take a major part to provide the obligations on the local authorities related to their better services, but only grants them power to do so. It is evident that if there is some problem with funding or services there may be a lot of old people can’t access the needed help and support from it. The National Health Service and community service at 1990 (NHS, CCA) S46 needs that every local authority must have a plan for their community care and they should be regular to make sure for the well fare of older people. It is the legislation that is important in some manner but it is failure in opening an account about the solid duty that is related to the local authorities to offer the help and support for the older people. The National Health Service Act, 1977 (NHSA) schedule 8, is aimed for providing services for the elder people who live in the local authority. This help is include with shopping, cooking, cleaning etc. it appears that a fame obligation on the local authority to offer the help and support. When an old person is recognised as to be given help and support from the part of the local authority, it is questionable that local authority is capable of helping and supporting of needed person. But from the part of the serviced user, in most of the cases the ultimate help from the local authority is not in a full result. And as the reason, the service from the local authority is not as much as improved than they started from. Residential accommodation The national assistance act 1948 (NAA) S.21 defines about the duties and obligations of the local authority to offer the accommodation for residence. As far as most of the laws connected to the adults is concerned, all those ones is included the right duties and obligations to provide help for the older people from the part of the local authorities. For example, the NAA 1948 (Choice of accommodation) directions 1992 were introduced to make the adults with accommodation and other needs. However the needed people are paid a specified amount. As the reason, the freedom of choice is cancelled since there are financial implications. Residential care is provided as an easily accessible one to 24 hour care home like it is the carefulness of local authority. Since there is choice, majority of the people would like to stay in the home, it is hard for a social worker to balance the value of his social work based on oppressive practice empowerment with financial implications and partnership and to be a well service provider with maximum help and support for the service user (Williams, 1992). The liberty of an adult is given with much priority. However in some cases, it is unavoidable for their own health safety and safety of others compulsory removals have been done. It means that it is the duty of a social worker to offer maximum support and help in the home environment itself (Norman and Redfern, 1997). It is significant to clarify that in residential homes there should be a high quality of caring and supporting. In some cases people in residential care has been exploited with neglect and employee abuse. The care standard act 2000 got introduced in order to make sure a regulatory system that is able to capable of delivering a high quality service with all its concerns (Burchell, 2000). In April 2002 with upgrading the services for vulnerable adults and children national care standard commission regulated the services. It includes four main components. They are monitoring, providing national bench marks, representing the consumer and encouraging the development of better services. It guarantees a new protection for vulnerable adults and it make sure to avoid the unsuitable people is not allowed to work with vulnerable adults (Williams, 1992). It established a general social care council for England and care council for Wales. It came to action with its first step as an effective act but the lacking of funding and human resources stopped its implementation with full perfection. In the care standard acts 2000, it mentions that there should be high quality social care worker provided with high standards of training. But it became questionable with the lack of funding, qualified trainers. In the article done by David Brindle, mentions that in UK the number of abuse against elderly people is alarming and it is growing as a top most problem to be rectified. Research shows that when the staffs are well trained and educated the abuse against elderly people is restricted or no longer a problem in the social care field. It means there are some staffs that are stress, over worked and feels undervalued can be the reason for abuse on adults. Studies prove that in some working area the care workers are not valued well, in some working environment they are stressed highly with their over working and hard working (Lechner and Neal, 1999). These are the problems that lead them to unleash their anger on elderly people and it comes to a result like abuse. It is estimated that there are 800,000 untrained staffs are involved in working with older people. If there is an action on elder abuse it may cost 600 pound each to make sure that they had recognised qualifications according to the charity. There are some potential employees have become part in abuse. In that case it is difficult to identify them and it should be the duty of a social care worker to guide and control himself at first. He should do his best with the support of good practice and vigilance. There should be consistency from the part of the employers, rigour, thoroughness in the implementation of needed checks and procedures that are apt in each and every time. Lacking of time, money or resources may be the problem with the employees. In other case, lacking of qualified and skilled employees with their leaving jobs is another problem. All together it is difficult to maintain an employee in an organisation providing his basic things. First of all there should be advanced type of training from the part of the organisation for the employees. It should help the employees to get matured and to know the rights and responsibilities in their duties to be done. Secondly providing value of an employee offering good salary and to give him comfortable shifting time to work is essential. It will enable him to feel comfortable in his working environment and to follow the duties and responsibility of his work. Thirdly, to stop the quitting jobs of employees an organisation should find out some strategies and techniques to retain their employees in their organisation (Roit, 2010). As far as abuse on elders is concerned from the part of the social care workers, the above said things are significant to rectify the problem to a great extent. Mental Health There are a lot of policies and legislations which related to it in the case of older people are established by the governments in the European countries especially in England. The elder people should be cared and support by the other people and society in their final stage of life and the value of humanity is considered by the each legislation and policies that established by the government. The law on mental health is very much as same as the law that is related to the groups of vulnerable adults. It is needed updating and consolidation. The department of health defines that there are some changes in mental health services with new drug treatments, different patterns of care, which is commonly seen in people treated in the community than in institutions and also wider role for other therapeutic approaches, these things have made a different landscape. As the reason modern mental health legislation is needed to reflect that landscape. Since the law has got updated approved social wo rker should be able to aware of his power and duties under the mental health act 1983. It is clear that the numbers of mentally ill patients are alarming and the treatment they get within the community is not fulfilled with its perfection. It needs support networks, more approved social workers and also better home services. But it is sad that the mentioned things are working efficiently very scarcely and the government should be able to provide extra funding to support their care in the community (Fulmer, Foreman and Walker, 2001). The national assembly for Wales started the adult mental health services strategy with four main key points. They are (1) Equity- it means, mental health service should be provided for the needed people with its perfection. (2) Empowerment- it means service users and carers should work together to find out a better strategy to help and support the mental health patients. (3) Effectiveness – there should be some effective intervention provided by mental health services that is needed for improving the quality of life. (4) Efficiency- the services of mental health should be capable of using the resources perfectly and they should care the public money is spent with accountability. In England it is questionable that mentally ill patients are treated well or not. In the past years there were good help and support for mentally ill patients from the part of the hospitals providing 63,000 beds in the year 1988. But in the year 2000, it was halved with 34, 3000 beds. Considering this number of beds and above said reasons there should be well planned strategies to provide maximum help and support for the mentally ill patient and also they should be in secure accommodation. Conclusion In conclusion, legislations, policies and guidelines for the caring and supporting for the older people are very important and effective in providing good and standard service. The government in the England and other European countries are providing a lot of rules, legislations, and policies to provide the support and good caring and support for the elder people in the society. Most of the legislations and the principles are followed by the each and every health professionals and it support to provide a standard and supporting care for the elder people. It is difficult for a social worker to provide maximum help and support for the vulnerable adults, to check it the care workers should ask questions by themselves and value the judgements by them related to the services that they provided. They should be capable of understanding where a person is in capable of taking decisions especially like a mentally ill patient. It means, the care worker should be the ultimate health provider apart from policies and procedures from the government. It means the more a social care worker is capable of handling his duty with its full perfection, the more he becomes available to the needs of service users. In the case of skilled employees in a health care organisation, there are some problems like burnout; quitting their jobs etc. these problems should be settled in with the perfect strategies from the government and health organisations as well. As far as the vulnerability of the adults is concerned there are some lack of clear legislation that hinters the correct implementation of the law and also the ambiguity of the law and all these things contribute to the lack of resources. References Backhaus, P. (2011) Communication in Elderly Care: Cross-Cultural Perspectives. Continuum International Publishing, Baggett, S. (1989) Residential Care for the Elderly: Critical Issues in Public Policy. Greenwood Publishing Group Capezuti, L., Siegler, and Mezey, M. D. (2007) Encyclopedia of Elder Care: The Comprehensive Resource on Geriatric and Social Care , Springer Publishing Company Duquenoy, P., George, C. and Kimppa, K. (2008) Ethical, Legal, And Social Issues In Medical Informatics . Idea Group Inc Fulmer, T. T., Foreman, M. D. and Walker, M. K. (2001) Critical Care Nursing of the Elderly. Springer Publishing Company Gupta, A., Playfer, J. and Bhowmick, B. (2008) Measurement Scales Used in Elderly Care. Radcliffe Publishing Kamp, A. and Hvid, H. (2012) Elderly Care in Transition: Management, Meaning and Identity at Work. A Scandinavian Perspective. Copenhagen Business School Press Lechner, V. M. and Neal, M. B. (1999) Work and Caring for the Elderly: International Perspective s. Routledge Miller, F. P., Vandome, A. F. and McBrewster , J. (2009) Elderly Care. Alphascript Publishing Norman, I. J. and Redfern, S. J. (1997) Mental Health Care for Elderly People. Elsevier Health Sciences, Roit, B. D. (2010). Strategies of Care: Changing Elderly Care in Italy and the Netherlands. Amsterdam University Press Williams, D. K. (1992) Residential Care Services for the Elderly: Business Guide for Home-Based Eldercare. Routledge