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Social Work With Older Adults in Health Care Practice Teaching Module

PowerPoint Teaching Module

This PowerPoint teaching module with teaching notes provides information on the following issues related to working with an aging population: demographic trends, health conditions, activities of daily living, health care utilization and implications, interdisciplinary team assessment, comprehensive geriatric assessment, geriatric evaluation and management, and outcomes of CGA and GEM.

This module also describes biopsychosocial assessment domains including physiological well-being and health, cognitive capacity, functional ability, social functioning, physical environment, family and social support, economic resources, values and preferences, and spiritual assessment. It discusses social work practice skills to work with older adults in various health care settings (primary care, in-patient hospital, home health, nursing home) and includes cases and discussion questions.

Syllabus

The teaching module references source material and has a Social Work With Older Adults in Health Care Practice syllabus (MS Word) for the course in which it is infused.

Competencies Addressed in This Module:

  1. Identify ways to ascertain the health status and physical functioning (e.g., ADLs and IADLs) of the older adult in order to provide assistance.
  2. Design service plans to help older people and their families manage/improve functioning with cognitive loss, health issues, and/or physical functioning.
  3. Provide comprehensive geriatric social work case management to link elders and their families to resources and services to assist them with multifaceted problems and provide long-term care planning.
  4. Integrate understanding of caretaker’s behavior; develop interventions that lead to engagement, withdrawal, disempowerment, or empowerment of elderly relative.
  5. Intervene sensitively and according to professional ethics to assist older adults and families who have diverse cultural, spiritual, and ethnic values and beliefs, including the areas of death and dying, hospice, and palliative care.