Round pegs in round holes: A social work/care management service for ‘vulnerable adults’ in West Oxfordshire

Abstract

Over recent years many Social Services Departments have tended towards specialist teams and away from genericism. One of the negative implications of this is that certain clients, though often clearly in need of a service from somewhere, do not ‘fit’ with the eligibility criteria of specialist teams. Hence, in West Oxfordshire, funding was allocated to a pilot post of social worker / care manager specifically for Vulnerable Adults. The postholder produced progress reports every three months, culminating in a twelve month report which forms the basis of this paper. This paper therefore stems from one approach to meeting the needs of Vulnerable Adults in practice. The performance of the post has been evaluated. This included client profiling and a quantification of outcomes to measure achievement in different aspects of the work.