What is it Like Working in Health and Social Care?
If you have a knack for caring and you would love to be involved in the health and social care sector, that’s a great decision and that is why this article is here to fill you in on the details of the nature of the job you are about to undertake and what you’ll be expecting. Basically, social care entails attending to the needs of individuals of different age brackets.
These needs are not broad needs, just their physical and emotional needs. Some are physically challenged, age, handicapped, depressed or even helpless. Now adding that to health care implies you will be providing some sort of medical attention to them beyond social care.
They both work in tango and is best they stay that way just in case you might need to counsel a patient who after being healed slumps into depression.
If you want to indulge in this career of helping lives and planting a smile of the faces of the needy, sick and helpless then you will be doing anyone of the following at any given time in your work schedule:
- Caring for individuals facing depression and emotional devastation through various therapies available at your disposal
- Helping the aged and wizened to live the last days of their lives in happiness because they won’t be struggling for much in terms of physical needs since you will be providing the needed assistance they require to get by everyday
- Helping mentally challenged individuals
- Helping the sick receive basic medical attention in local communities like administering first aid essentials to tackle emergency health situations and CPR
- Attending to addicts (drugs, sex, alcohol, masturbation) with therapies and counselling in rehabilitation schemes organized for them
- Helping physically challenged individuals live a life with less stress and inspiring them to lead better lives without getting depressed
- Helping children with special needs
- Collaborating with health practitioners to bring health care to people who can barely access them
- Travelling to local communities and remote areas for health sensitization workshops and even attending to the sick in their homes alongside other social and health workers
- Providing health consultation services
- Helping people with trampled self-esteem get back on their feet
- Helping the physically abused like victims of rape recover physically and mentally
- Modifying treatment methods to suit a patient’s need
- Counselling discharged patients on ways to prevent future occurrences of same illness
- If you are a female, you’ll be performing some of the roles of an auxiliary nurse in most settings especially in nursing homes
Working Hours
Working hours often vary per location. In areas where medical facilities are rare and you are on a government intervention program to provide affordable health care, you could be working round the clock due to surge in population. That situation could get worse if the medical facility is short-staffed.
Same goes for social care. Care workers are being recruited yearly to address the teeming needs of locals in rural settings where access to such services are limited but they never seem to suffice.
Working as one you could translate to you doing a marathon kind of job. Shifts are however available to curb stress and allow workers time to rejuvenate.
