Social Work Approaches in Health and Mental Health from Around the Globe

Overcome the challenges facing social workers today with international guidance

Social Work Approaches in Health and Mental Health from Around the Globe is a valuable stepping stone toward an understanding of the diversity of methods utilized in social work for community health services. This work stems from material gathered at the Third International Conference on Social Work in Health and Mental Health, held in Tampere, Finland. In this book, you will find new creative theoretical and practical orientations for designing, developing, and analyzing social work to help you produce policies and services in which clients can positively and productively invest.

Social Work Approaches in Health and Mental Health from Around the Globe covers a long period in the history of social work in health issues, from theoretical treatises to empirical research and analyses of practices. The book provides you with research, case studies, and existing international and national literature from India, Botswana, Taiwan, Lithuania, the United Kingdom, Australia, and the United States. This resource explores the shared qualities of social work in health services throughout the world despite differences between countries in terms of culture, social system, and history.

Although these experts come from different parts of the world, the book displays an emergence of similar issues and themes, including:

• the development of expertise for social workers in the health and mental health fields
  
• social work as an agent of change that crosses borders, operates on many levels, and across many dimensions of society
  
• community-based care—principles, perspectives, marginalized groups, and the role of the social worker
  
• dual divisions—becoming aware of and choosing a position in work practice