Blog Posts Profile image APAQCC Contributes to Professional Development - Professional Development By Donald Rolfe on November 12, 2014 Professional Development APAQCC Contributes to Professional Development By Sherry Laniado, MSW, LCSW, OSW-C Professional Development Editor Now that participants have been chosen, the APAQCC Research Project is set to begin. A multisite research project conducted by social workers does not happen often. It has great potential to not only contribute to our knowledge but also to influence the medical community in many ways. It brings increased awareness of the psychosocial needs of cancer patients and their families as well as increased respect for the profession of social work and social work skills. Three recently chosen participants in this project discuss how they feel this project will affect their professional development. Brandon Reeves, LCSW Mary Bird-Our Lady of the Lake Center Baton Rouge, Louisiana Like many of you, several months back I began receiving announcements about the opportunity to participate in “A Program to Assure Quality Cancer Care” (APAQCC). These announcements caught my eye and I began to explore the project and its goals. I have to admit, the first thing that caught my eye was the availability of a stipend to be used for professional development and education. Everyone Ive spoken to recently has experienced a tightening of the budget belt related to conferences and other professional education activities, and a stipend would certainly help pay for next years conference attendance. But, theres no such thing as a free lunch, right? So I began to look for the catch, and I quickly found it—Research. If you are like many other social workers I know, love, and respect, the word “research” invokes an involuntary response that might include cold sweats and nausea, as you recall your statistics class in grad school where you had to calculate t-scores by hand (for you younger social workers, statistics wasnt always as easy as plugging your data into excel and selecting the correct formula). I am one of the rare social workers who actually enjoys research and statistics, at least in the abstract. In my post-school work experience, however, real research has not been a priority. This project represented an opportunity for me to participate in research, as well as to contribute to our knowledge base about psychosocial distress in cancer patients and, more specifically, to examine our local practices in our cancer center. My hope is that, in addition to the above benefits of participating in the project, others in the cancer center will see a social worker engaged in a research activity and will rethink, if only for a second, their misconceptions about social work. The recognition that social workers are engaged in research and are interested in evidence and outcomes can only serve to bolster our reputations in the world of medicine and, in particular, oncology. Elizabeth Angell, MSW, LCSW, OSW-C The Roger Williams Cancer Center Providence, Rhode Island I am excited and honored to have been chosen to participate in “A Project to Assure Quality Cancer Care.” The Roger Williams Cancer Center is the only Bone Marrow Transplant Center in Rhode Island. We have been utilizing the Distress Screen to be able to better serve our patient population since March 2013. As the only oncology social worker in our outpatient setting, I am encouraged that my participation in the project will assist me in addressing the needs of our patients and their families. The world we live in encompasses many challenges for our patients and families. Physicians and the medical community as a whole are now beginning to acknowledge that patients psychosocial well-being is instrumental in their overall quality of life and their ability to cope with their diagnosis. I believe this project will influence the care that medical professionals strive to deliver, as well as reinforce the importance and necessity of the role of the oncology social worker. When a person hears that initial diagnosis, “You have Cancer,” their level of distress automatically increases. I am looking to this project to assist in identifying better tools to help patients prior to them walking through our door. I hope to be able to provide support and interventions prior to an individual sitting in an exam room or an infusion chair. Carolyn L. Jones, LCSW, and Kristi Stewart, LCSW Sutter Medical Foundation Sacramento, California Thank you for this opportunity to share with you our thoughts about participating in the APAQCC project. We are full time LCSWs in Medical Oncology/Hematology in Californias Sacramento and Placer Counties. We are collaborating in this research as we work with our distinctly diverse populations. We feel privileged to partner with many oncology sites around the country. This will be the first social work research project conducted in our clinic specifically addressing the psychosocial feature of our clinical work. This is a step to another level of professional development that will encourage our own research or participation in others’ research. We expect to continue pursuing empirically based techniques and tools with best practice outcomes. As a result of this research, we hope to increase our ability to engage our medical team in new ways, utilizing proven methodologies for advancing our clinical expertise while reaching for positive outcomes related to our patients psychosocial health. This project has come at the right time, as we find it crucial to build a higher level of awareness of psychosocial needs and outcomes for our patients safety, health, and welfare. Author contact: [email protected]
Posted on: Fri, 14 Nov 2014 13:19:25 +0000
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