Social work's contribution to integrated primary health care teams in the UK for older adults with complex needs

Bailey, D ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5823-7746 and Mutale, GJ ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7743-2675, 2022. Social work's contribution to integrated primary health care teams in the UK for older adults with complex needs. Journal of Integrated Care. ISSN 1476-9018

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Abstract

Purpose: This study examined the contribution of adult social work in integrated teams in the UK.

Design/methodology/approach: The study design was realist, evaluation research using a mixed methods approach. Data collection methods included interviews and focus groups. Types of social work activities were extracted from older adults' case records and used to calculate costs of care. The presence or absence of indicators of care quality was recorded using the same sample of case records. Data were collected from three primary care teams in which social work was integrated. They were compared with data from three social-work-only teams in the same districts. Narrative data was analysed thematically. Inferential and descriptive statistics were used to compare costs and care quality.

Findings: When social work was embedded or attached to a primary care team, costs of care delivery were lower than in their social-work-only team and more indicators of good quality care outcomes were recorded. Results suggest that embedding social work in integrated primary care teams contributes to cost-effective, quality care for older people if certain conditions for integration are met.

Originality/value: This is the first study to triangulate three data sources to quantify the social work contribution to integrated primary health care teams for older adults.

Item Type:	Journal article
Publication Title:	Journal of Integrated Care
Creators:	Bailey, D. and Mutale, G.J.
Publisher:	Emerald
Date:	26 April 2022
ISSN:	1476-9018
Identifiers:	Number Type 10.1108/jica-10-2021-0053 DOI 1540192 Other
Rights:	This Gold Open Access article is published under a CC BY Creative Commons licence. The full terms of this licence may be seen at http://creativecommons.org/licences/by/4.0/legalcode © Bailey, D., & Mutale, G. J. (2022). Social work's contribution to integrated primary health care teams in the UK for older adults with complex needs. Journal of Integrated Care, https://doi.org/10.1108/jica-10-2021-0053. Published by Emerald Publishing Limited.
Divisions:	Schools > School of Social Sciences
Record created by:	Linda Sullivan
Date Added:	27 Apr 2022 07:45
Last Modified:	27 Apr 2022 07:45
URI:	https://irep.ntu.ac.uk/id/eprint/46204

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