Ethical Decision Making and Social Work

Today is my third day blogging.

I'm going to write about one of my morning lectures.  In my first morning lecture, I reviewed ethical decision-making in the work place with students.  The conversation was borne of a set of ethical considerations that a student posted as part of her chapter presentation.  I was so impressed with her presentation that I asked her to go back to the ethics slide so we could review it as a class.  Here are some of the ethical dilemmas we reviewed today:

What should I do if my agency physically restrains clients and I hold a personal belief against this?

How do I decide whether to carry out activities in my practicum that my family or friends have asked me not to do?

What should I do if I'm asked to conduct a home visit even after I discussed my uneasiness about the arrangements with my field instructor?

I found the class' responses to these questions to be fascinating.  They ranged in responses from "You knew what you were getting into, deal with it," to, "well, we should be considerate of the workers feelings and to explore why the worker feels this way."  For clarification:  The students in this class are all interning at various agency locations.  They are all attuned to the seriousness of these questions because they are all immersed in various agency settings.  So, unlike a course where we might be asked to consider hypothetical situations outside our actual experience of said situations, there were a number of students in this class who really felt like they had a vested interest in hammering out where they might go with these situations.

A long discussion ensued and revolved around the issue of what is required of us (students) in a learning capacity (because an internship is not a job, it is a learning experience) and how that learning experience translates to the world of work.

One of the students was very animated, and expressed her consternation about the question regarding physical restraints, stating, "I work in a hospital, and sometimes there are patients that have to be restrained.  When they have to be restrained it is because it is for their own good.  When this happens we just have to deal with it.  It's not happening for the heck of it."  To which I responded, "having worked in hospital and nursing home settings, I know the professionals in these settings are required to go through regularly scheduled trainings on restraining patients and that there are often committees that address the ethics of physical restraint."

Another student thanked those of us who spoke as there was much about ethics in practice that she hadn't been exposed to, and so she found this discussion to be particularly enlightening for her.

Yet another student spoke about the dilemma of being asked to do things that one's own family or friends advise against.  I steered this conversation in a different direction, pointing out that over the course of my professional social work career, I knew of two social workers who were fired from the agencies where I worked because it was obvious to a client who met the social workers out and about in public that the social worker's spouse knew the client's business.  In both of these situations, the client was able to articulate what they knew the spouse felt due to their body language and things the spouse said to the worker's client.  

The discussion about confidentiality and how people feel comfortable speaking with their significant others'/spouses morphed into a discussion about how discussing the details of our work with family can get us into a lot of trouble.  I asked students about how, when we many us understand our spouses are people we should be able to trust with our feelings and observations, even of feelings and observations at work that involve clients and confidential information.  Aside from the obvious need to keep confidential matters confidential, I reminded the students about how our training often differs from the experiences of our spouses.

I reminded them about the discussions we've had about non-verbal communication, tone, eye contact and how, while we may be very aware of such things, our spouses and significant other's are likely not as attuned to their own body language and how their true feelings in such circumstances, like a chance meeting with a client, can lead what could have been an innocuous social encounter into one where the client feels betrayed by their social worker.  

Footnote:  I went back and reread the Slice of Life challenge.  I do not have to be so rigid with the theme of my blog, so, I'll just write about whatever comes to mind each day.

hat should I do if my agency physically restrainsclients and I hold a personal belief against this?