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Smith, Nick; Rand, Stacey; Morgan, Sarah; Jones, Karen; Hogan, Helen; Dargan, Alan
2023 The Journal of Adult Protection
This paper aims to explore the content of Safeguarding Adult Reviews (SARs) from older adult care homes to understand how safety is understood and might be measured in practice.Design/methodology/approachSARs relevant to older adult care homes from 2015 onwards were identified via the Social Care Institute of Excellence SARs library. Using thematic analysis, initial inductive coding was mapped to a health-derived safety framework, the Safety Measurement and Monitoring Framework (SMMF).FindingsThe content of the SARs reflected the dimensions of the SMMF but gaining a deeper understanding of safety in older adult care homes requires additional understanding of how this unique context interacts with these dimensions to create and prevent risks and harms. This review identified the importance of external factors in care home safety.Originality/valueThis study provides an insight into the scope of safety issues within care homes using the SARs content, and in doing so improves understanding of how it might be measured. The measurement of safety in care homes needs to acknowledge that there are factors external to care homes that a home may have little knowledge of and no ability to control.
2023 The Journal of Adult Protection
The purpose of this paper is to highlight the issue of carers as victims and perpetrators of domestic abuse. The issue of carers as victims, and sometimes perpetrators, of domestic abuse is being overlooked by statutory organisations because they often do not fit the traditional patterns of abusive relationships, and the complexities of the caring role can make typical safety options unsuitable. However, caring responsibilities are a feature of an increasing number of domestic homicide reviews, and current statutory safeguarding options exclude most carers from support and risk not identifying perpetrators.Design/methodology/approachThis short paper highlights some of the shortfalls around identifying the needs of carer victims/survivors of domestic abuse and carer-perpetrators of domestic abuse and explores ways in which identification and support could be improved.FindingsCarers as victims/survivors of domestic abuse, and as abusers, is an issue that requires more attention from researchers and Adult Social Care, NHS, Carer Support Organisations and Domestic Abuse specialists need to work together to explore these issues and offer workable options.Originality/valueLittle data or research exists around carers as victims or perpetrators of domestic abuse.
2023 The Journal of Adult Protection
The purpose of the study is to explore the contribution of safeguarding adult reviews (SARs) to the contemporary stories of what social work practice is and what social workers should do. Evidence of this contribution is sought by analysis of SARs as publicly available documents capturing contemporary social work alongside considering social worker’s views of these reports.Design/methodology/approachThis paper presents two components of the wider research study as follows: documentary analysis exploring discussions of social work practice held within a sample of SARs xD;xA; and analysis of focus groups and semi-structured interviews established to explore the knowledge, experience and views of front-line social workers in relation to SARs.FindingsIt is suggested that social workers locate the value of SARs within the arena of learning and development often celebrating the SAR processes in bringing agencies together more so than the actual report. This paper argues that SARs hold considerable power in their ability to present a narrative about contemporary social work in England, and that social workers themselves can be wary of this power.Research limitations/implicationsThe research is limited by the scope of the data which includes a sample of SARs from one geographical area and data collected from social workers who volunteered to participate.Practical implicationsThis paper draws on the evidence gathered and presents some recommendations to support the potential for SARs to positively enhance social work identity and practice.Social implicationsThis paper explores the stories about social work that are found within a sample of SARs and seeks to explore how these stories fit with the stories that social workers themselves share about SARs.Originality/valueThere has been considerable research interest in SARs; however, to date there has not been a research exploration of the impact of SARs on professional social work and front-line social workers in practice. This paper presents early findings and analysis from research in progress as part of a Doctorate of Social Work Study at University of East London who provided ethical approval and supervisory support.
2023 The Journal of Adult Protection
The purpose of this paper is to identify the factor structure of the Ways of Coping Questionnaire (WCQ) among abused Iranian women.Design/methodology/approachThis paper is a methodological study. The participants included 554 abused married women who were selected by convenience sampling from the women presenting to health centers and hospitals and their companions as well as women visiting mosques and parks in Shahroud, Iran. The exploratory factor analysis was used to investigate the factor structure of the WCQ. The reliability of the questionnaire was estimated using Cronbach’s alpha coefficient.FindingsFollowing the exploratory factor analysis, 36 items and 5 factors were extracted, which could explain 73.24% of the variance in the concept of coping with intimate partner violence. The extracted factors included distancing, planning, wishful thinking, seeking social support and problem-solving. Cronbach’s alpha coefficient of the questionnaire as a whole was 0.91.Originality/valueThis paper has practice and research implications for promoting coping among abused women. The factor structure of the WCQ obtained in this paper can validly measure coping with intimate partner violence among abused Iranian women. Learning about the coping strategies used by abused women can help design context-based interventions to assist these women in better coping with their husband’s violence and improving their well-being. This version of WCQ also enables assessing the effectiveness of the designed interventions.