As the paradigm of medical sector has shifted to client-centered one from supplier-centered one, quality service is accentuated to raise user satisfaction, and such a change in medical environments calls on medical social welfare sector, which deals w...
As the paradigm of medical sector has shifted to client-centered one from supplier-centered one, quality service is accentuated to raise user satisfaction, and such a change in medical environments calls on medical social welfare sector, which deals with the sociopsychological aspects of patients and their families, to offer more competitive services.
Medical social workers work with other professionals together, and a lot of hospitals employ only a medical social worker. In some hospitals where several medical social workers serve together, they are recognized as professionals, but that's not the case for most hospitals. Therefore, medical social workers are easily likely to be exhausted or demotivated, which results in throwing their identity into confusion. There are a lot of factors to concern the expertise and identity of medical social welfare, and few domestic studies have ever focused on supervision, one of the factors, though its importance has been highlighted.
The purpose of this study was to delve into the state of supervision among medical social workers who worked at medical institutes, and to make a comparative analysis of expertise improvement between medical social workers who were supervised and who weren't. It's ultimately meant to lay the foundation for establishing a more efficient and professional supervision system in order to assist medical social workers to improve their expertise and build their identity.
The subjects in this study were every medical social worker who worked at hospitals and clinics across the nation. They numbered 335, and after a survey was conducted, the responses from 169 people were gathered. The response rate was 50 percent, and 158 answer sheets were analyzed except incomplete 11 ones. What's investigated in the study was the general characteristics of the subjects, their working environ- ments, the state of supervision among them, the outlook of supervisees and supervisors on the administrative, educational and supportive function and roles of supervision, their satisfaction with supervision, problems with it, the general characteristics of supervisee and supervisor, their working environments, the actual state of supervision, and the relationship of their satisfaction level with supervision to their view of supervision function and role. In addition, their opinions on how much medical social workers who were supervised and who weren't improved in terms of expertise were compared.
The findings of the study were as follows :
First, concerning the state of supervision, 63.5 percent of the subjects fulfilled supervision on a regular basis. That was universally implemented everyday, and 72.3 percent conducted it once or more times a week. As to supervision type, individual supervision was prevailing, and verbal supervision was most widespread, compared to written or recorded one. Clinical skills were mostly supervised, and 98.7 percent felt the need for supervision. As for the reason, they made the improvement of expertise a priority and regarding the question what favorable change would be brought about by successful supervision, they believed that it would make the greatest contribution to the development of programs, and that it will make the second greatest contribution to preventing them from being burnt out.
When the medical social workers who weren't supervised were asked about the reason, a lack of supervision system was identified as the most common reason, followed by a lack of supervisors. 97.5 percent of them wanted to be supervised if there's any chances, and they found supervision most necessary to boost their professional qualifications and build their identity.
Second, as for the function and role of supervision, educational function was most emphasized, followed by supportive and administrative function. Most of the supervisors considered their own performance to be on or above average, but the supervisees had a less favorable opinion on their performance. Overall, they put lower value on the supervisors who found themselves to perform better.
Third, both supervisors and supervisees were generally satisfied with their current supervision and being supervised respectively, and they expressed the best satisfaction at its effect on work efficiency and clinical skills acquisition. They considered themselves to take an active attitude toward supervision, and the most common hindrance to that was a lack of time on the side of the supervisors, followed by time constraints on the side of supervisees.
Fourth, regarding connections between the general characteristics of the supervisees and their view of supervision function and role, those who were better educated and had a higher position took a more positive view of supervision, and the gap between them and the others was statistically significant. As to the impact of their current work place, one of working environments, the supervisees who worked at university hospitals had a more positive opinion than those who worked at general hospitals, hospitals or clinics, and the gap between them was significant. Concerning the impact of the state of supervision, the supervisors and supervisees viewed supervision more favorably when supervision was conducted on a regular basis and more frequently, when they were more satisfied with it and when they took a more active attitude toward it. And the gap between them and the others was significant. As for supervision type, the supervisors who provided individual supervision had a more favorable outlook than the other supervisors who offered colleague supervision or supervised in a group or other way. Their opinion on administrative supervision was significantly different.
Fifth, when the medical social workers who were supervised and who weren't were compared, the supervised medical social workers found themselves to make a better progress in expertise than the others did, and the gap between them was statistically significant a lot.
Based on the above-mentioned findings, there are some suggestions about how to dynamize supervision among medical social workers :
First, supervision is mandatory to enhance the professional qualifications of medical social workers.
Second, supervision should be implemented on a regular basis, once or more times a week at least.
Third, both supervisors and supervisees should take an active attitude toward that.
Fourth, in order to narrow the gap between the two groups' view of supervision, both groups should give and take feedback.
Fifth, supervisors should be given more opportunities to take education and get training in diverse manner to take their qualifications to another level.
Sixth, a sort of supervision system should be built to link medical social workers who work alone to supervisors from other organizations or experts.