Experiences of social workers in the provision of mental health services in KwaZulu-Natal

Abstract

There is growing recognition that mental health is an important public health issue in South Africa, yet mental health services remain chronically under-resourced. This study was conducted in the Durban & Coastal Mental Health Organisation in KwaZulu-Natal.

The aim of this study was to explore the experiences of social workers in the provision of mental health services in KwaZulu-Natal. The ecological systems theory underpinned this study. As the researcher wanted to understand the experiences of social workers in the provision of mental health services, according to their daily activities or practice, a qualitative study was appropriate and interpretivism was used as the research paradigm. The researcher used non-probability purposive sampling with selection criteria. Ten participants were purposively selected from the Durban & Coastal Mental Health Organisation. A semi-structured interview, with an interview schedule was utilised to collect data and it was comprised of open-ended questions to find out about their experiences in rendering mental health services. Attention was given to the ethical considerations and Ethics approval was obtained from the Faculty of Humanities Ethics Committee. The interviews were transcribed and the emerging data was analysed by means of identifying themes from all ten participants. The research question was: What are the experiences of social workers in the provision of mental health services in KwaZulu-Natal?

The findings revealed that participant social workers have knowledge of mental health services in general and of generic social work, as well as knowledge of the roles of a social worker in mental health. Participants’ were able to express themselves with regards to rendering counselling services on understanding and accepting the illness and linking the service users to resources that are going to best help them. However, they lack knowledge of the DSM and Mental Health Act (17 of 2002). The findings also revealed that the BSW programme in South Africa is not structured in a way that allows social workers to practice in the mental health field. There is a need for social workers to gain knowledge and understanding of mental health, specifically in order to be able to practice in this field. Consequently, the participants also felt that the supervision they are receiving needs to be improved, as there are no other supportive measures or debriefing provided, in order for them to perform their roles effectively, except for the supervision. A range of experiences of participant were also described in terms of their challenges, negative and positive experiences.

General recommendations were put forward from this study and these included the need to prioritise mental health services by the government and training in mental health care for social workers to be facilitated at all levels. Furthermore, also to include mental health in the BSW undergraduate programme in order to give social workers a background to practice in the mental health field.

While the aim and objectives of this study were met, the researcher emphasised the need for future research to focus on determining possible effective ways of addressing the challenges identified amongst participants in the provision of mental health care services in this study.