Discussion 1: hospice social work

Progress in Palliative Care 2010 Vol 18 No 4 205

An overview of contemporary social work
practice in palliative care

Susan Cadell1, Meagan Johnston2, Harvey Bosma3, Wendy Wainright4

1Manulife Centre for Healthy Living, and Lyle S. Hallman Faculty of Social Work, Wilfrid Laurier
University, Kitchener-Waterloo, Ontario, Canada
2Alberta Children’s Hospital, Calgary, Alberta, Canada
3School of Social Work, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
4Psychosocial Counselling Services, Victoria Hospice, Victoria, British Columbia, Canada

It is widely acknowledged that social workers play a pivotal role in the delivery of palliative care. A
group undertook a process to define and validate social work competencies in palliative and end-
of-life care delivery. The aim of this article is to provide an overview of the palliative care social work
practice competencies developed in the Canadian context and to illustrate them with case
examples. The competencies involve a complex interaction of values, knowledge and skills. The
next phase in the development of these competencies is to embed them in the system of social
work education at all levels. The case examples illustrate the importance of social work practice in
palliative care. They also demonstrate that the competencies are interconnected as certain aspects
of social work practice and client and family experience arise in various areas and guises.
Ultimately, the goal is excellent palliative care to clients and their families throughout the trajectory
of a serious illness and social workers have an important role to play in that.

Keywords: social work competencies, paediatric palliative care, palliative care, hospice care

Introduction

It is widely acknowledged that social workers play a
pivotal role in the delivery of palliative care.1 In the
Canadian context, social workers have been involved
in healthcare and hospital work for many years and
have been implicated in palliative care since its earliest
history. More recently, various professions involved in
palliative care in Canada have moved to formalise the
competencies required in palliative care. A pan-
Canadian group undertook a process to define and

validate social work competencies in palliative and
end-of-life care delivery.2 The present article will focus
on describing the competencies and providing
examples of social work practice for each one. It is our
aim to demonstrate the breadth of practice in palli-
ative care across the ages of clients from child to adult
and throughout a variety of settings, family com-
positions, and cultural influences.

The work of establishing the social work
competencies was supported by Health Canada, our
national health body, and its Secretariat of Palliative
and End of Life Care. The group included social
workers from across the country and various practice
areas, from hos