Understanding Specific Needs in Health and Social Care

This report explores the complexities of health, disability, illness, and behavior in the context of health and social care services. It examines how perceptions of specific needs have evolved over time, highlighting the impact of legislation, social policy, society, and culture on service provision. The report delves into the care needs of individuals with specific needs, analyzing current support systems and evaluating the effectiveness of intervention strategies. It also discusses the potential impact of emerging developments on support for individuals with specific needs. Finally, the report examines challenging behavior associated with specific needs, analyzing strategies for working with such behaviors and their impact on health and social care organizations.

HEALTH AND SOCIAL CARE UNDERSTANDING SPECIFIC NEEDS IN
H&SC
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Table of Contents
Introduction:....................................................................................................................................3
LO1..................................................................................................................................................4
1.1 Analyse concepts of health, disability, illness and behaviour in relation to users of health and
social care services..........................................................................................................................4
1.2. Assess how perceptions of specific needs have changed over time.........................................5
1.3. Analyse the impact of legislation, social policy, society and culture on the ways that services
are made available for individuals with specific needs...................................................................6
LO2..................................................................................................................................................7
2.1. Analyse the care needs of individuals with specific needs.......................................................7
2.2. Explain current systems for supporting individuals with specific needs..................................8
2.3. Evaluate the services available in a chosen locality for individuals with specific needs.........9
LO3................................................................................................................................................10
3.1. Explain the approaches and interventions available to support individuals with specific
needs..............................................................................................................................................10
3.2. Evaluate the effectiveness of intervention strategies for an individual with specific need(s).
.......................................................................................................................................................12
3.3. Discuss the potential impact of emerging developments on support for individuals with
specific needs.................................................................................................................................13
LO4................................................................................................................................................14
4.1. Explain different concepts of challenging behavior...............................................................14
4.2. Describe the potential impact of challenging behavior on health and social care
organizations..................................................................................................................................15
Conclusion:....................................................................................................................................17
Reference list:................................................................................................................................18
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Introduction:
Health and social care is a phrase that resolves round the service that is provided to be beneficial
for physical condition and societal concerns towards a human being. There is a huge divergence
between the medical and social representation of the notion about fitness and disability. The
project will shade light upon the fact how the social systems have treated the differently able
people since eras and how the topic, ‘human rights’, has been an out of context concern area for
those. The project exposes also the interrelation between health, disability, illness and behavior
that either can bring a new phase in the life of the victim or can push the individual towards
immense darkness and the role of it is very much dependent on the acts of the four factors. The
involvement of society to disallow this group of individuals has been restricted since the
effectiveness of equality act and human rights act as well.
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LO1
1.1 Analyse concepts of health, disability, illness and behaviour in relation to users of
health and social care services.
In general, the concept of health is related to the physical fitness that is proven by medical tests.
However, being healthy is not only being medically fit. As defined by World Health
Organization (WHO) the healthiness involves the physical, mental and social comfort an
individual lives in. People tend to consider only physically fit person to be healthy but this
should not be the only parameter to judge the health condition (McRoy, 2016). In case of Baby
Peter, a son of Tracy Connelly, the fitness was hampered from all the aspects. He was neither
physically fit nor mentally.
Illness is a mental state that follows a disease. In most of the cases, diseases leave a range of
wider effects on the patients. This varies according the nature of the disease. If this is acute, the
span of recovery is quite short (Ozer, 2015). However, if the diseases are severe like Cancer or
HIV positive, there is a long-term effect on the individual both physically and mentally.
Depression and anxiety grab them as side effects of the diseases. Disability is a kind of disorder
that hinders the normal growth of the body and mind. Generally, diseases like cough and cold or
fever interrupt the process of growth on a temporary basis.
However, the ones that leave a lifelong effect on the individual are considered as ‘Disability’. In
most of the cases, disability never leaves the affected individuals permanently but that should not
stop them for normal activities ever (Jung, 2015). However, Society is always very judgmental
towards them and the approach of its dwellers stops them to live a normal human being’s life.
These differently able persons to face huge challenges throughout their lives and here comes the
role of behavior of the people around them. The person who has to face many challenges already
again becomes a victim of the discriminative society. They deserve a life of a normal man and
they should not be stopped from the common participation with normal people. With this
behavioral gesture towards them only can they overcome the trauma usually they live in (Pollard
et al., 2014)
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1.2. Assess how perceptions of specific needs have changed over time.
There are no explicit considerations of specific requirements. However, with passage of time
things have changed in comparison to the treatment with them in earlier days. Physical
disabilities have always been related to superstitious beliefs. Different populace belonged to
different locations nurture diverse kinds of mentality regarding them. In most of the cases, they
are thought to be possessed by any spirit or demon. To make them recover people used to follow
the way that involved physical and mental torture. This particular attitude is a big obstacle in
their possible growth. The most of this lot belonged to the religious group in order to expel the
spirit they had a belief in (Sousa, 2016). Different Christian doctrines and centre of population
from all over the globe have argued about the theories of recognizing the disable individuals.
Even some people could not take the country policies and assistance towards them. They did not
have a support for this as they used to consider them as a part of paranormal world. Hence, their
suggestions were to put them to painful death in order to punish the sprit within. Even a tendency
to consider them as an inferior lot was there in the normal people. In few of the African
countries, handicapped people were said to have a connection with the supernatural world and
this led them to be compelled to stay alone, and separately where instead of being taken care of
they were subjected to torture, abuse and harassment (Hemm et al., 2015).
Now things have changed along with the prevalence of education. People have fought for their
rights. They took initiatives to pass a law for them in order to give them what they deserve.
Certain acts and their execution showed the way to an assured employment and lodging safety
for the exceptional needed people. In case of HL who was abandoned in a hospital for long 32
years because of his disability, Mr E and Mrs E took help of the law and they became able to
bring him home and giving him a homely atmosphere that he needed badly to live a normal life
(Romelczyk et al., 2015). Nowadays, people with challenges have newly named as differently
able in few countries. Paralympic games are arranged nowadays to stage their talent in front of
the world and embrace them a feeling that they also can what a normal man does.
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1.3. Analyse the impact of legislation, social policy, society and culture on the ways that
services are made available for individuals with specific needs.
The change in laws and acts, in the gesture of the society towards the differently able people has
left an imprint in the way of life of the lot. They are the community who face different kinds of
challenges and social discriminations since eras. The new acts in favor of them made the rough
path easy for them. The main motto of passing these laws is to provide them with the rights they
deserve as a human being and reducing the scope of being victimized. They were ever denied by
society and the change in legislation and social policy let them display their artistic and sports
skill. A restricted access to different platforms has always been imposed upon them unfairly. In
different spheres, they were subject to merciless torture and brutal abuse. However, the law and
act are not enough to better their position in society.
This is possible only when the gesture is changed towards them in a whole. In case study about
Baby P, the failure of legislation, regulations, special child care service as the death of the baby
was caused by the mere negligence of the concerned agencies. The child was abused, raped and
tortured but still the authority was unable to take effective steps. However, now there are quotas
reserved for the differently able individuals but that did not really make any difference in many
cases as they are continuously facing discrimination issues. In order to bring them back to the
normal flow of life there is a long way to go further. The negative role of the society in terms to
restrict them from every sphere of a normal life has been reduces since the act of equality and
human rights has been implemented (Hemm et al., 2015).
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LO2
2.1. Analyse the care needs of individuals with specific needs
Specific need implies the assistance that is necessary for an individual who is not enough to
execute his own activities as this becomes a little bit difficult for them to adapt fast changes in
situations. These people should be nurtured with all kind of care, privileges and civil liberties
and acts have been applied to provide them with all these. These inabilities could be related to
eyes, ears, brain or any other such as delayed developments or Down syndrome. People with
these kinds of difficulties need love, care and attention (Tomlinson, 2015). The system should
take into account the wants of these people, and it is their job to make sure that exceptional care
is taken of them. Regular enquiry can help them find out whether family they are staying in is
competent as much as necessary to take care of them. To make sure that the needs of these
people are satisfied form time to time would entail the teamwork of a variety of groups, which
takes in health and educational experts, parents, advocate and a wider choice of outer
communities such as psychologists and social service providers. Health and social care setup and
their association with broader communities can accomplish the concern needs of these persons
and lend a hand towards them to let them lead a normal life. The facility users will have different
requirements for example felt needs, expressed needs, normative needs and comparative needs
(Vickers, 2017). Most of that involve to the type of health developments they need to have a
healthy metabolism depending on the study bound profile of the service provider.
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2.2. Explain current systems for supporting individuals with specific needs.
Specific needs are all about to nurture the growth of the special children. Differently able persons
must be given the belief that they are capable of living a normal life. This lot should get the
assistance such a way that they become sufficient to go through any thick and thin in life. The
authority must assure security and assistance and at the same time, a good infrastructure should
be provided to let them reach the life style of a normal human being. A system is there to ensure
that the work place or the educational institutions, health and social care service, are working
properly to make their access easy to normal lifestyle. Previously this was observed that most of
the families who had a special child with them were not educated enough to deal with them
neither they were well informed about the government passed rules and regulations.
At very early age the care should be started to be taken. First and foremost an ideal household
full of positive vibes must be there where a special child will grow up because if there is
negativity, depression and regret to have a child like this will be all around; there will be chances
for the child’s mental and health condition to deteriorate. Next comes the necessity to understand
the actual help area a special needs person requires assistance in. Then the scope for them to
excel in the genre they are good in increases. However, the entire process should kick-start at the
very early stage. At the same time, people with disabilities are sometimes tough to handle but
with love, care and affection this is no hard to deal with them.
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2.3. Evaluate the services available in a chosen locality for individuals with specific needs.
The selected area is London Borough to assess the services for specific needs persons. There are
several approaches applied by the assembly to sustain the families and special needs child but the
above all counseling services are most applied ones, rehabilitation programs, day care centers
and recreational activities. The assembly has a belief in applying competent ways to offer them
with the amenities they deserve. They like to pay particular attention to maximizing the effect of
limited communal expenses to make most of it. The council engages a variety of ranges of
communities and youth workforce and social agencies that aid them to come to a decision of
making the most use of the funds offered to them (Ozer, 2015). Youth is the prospect of the
world so, they stress on the schemes forwarded by the young group because they have strength
of mind to make a change in the world (Swaffer, 2014). The council wishes to prioritize the
limited setting on the first go and they can restructure the Health and Social Care setup. Most of
the differently able people are familiar with wheelchair and elevator, with the resources applied
in setting up plank, overpass then they can be able to move and the number of mishaps
happening will be reduced around community centers and the schools.
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LO3
3.1. Explain the approaches and interventions available to support individuals with specific
needs.
An individual, who has limitations in aspects of emotional, social, behavioral or any kind of
impairments such as visual, auditory etc, need special care or attention from the society. These
kinds of individuals are referred as the individuals with specific need. A number of institution or
organizations can be found who are working relentlessly to help these individuals (Stokes, 2017).
These organizations take up various intervention strategies and supports in order improve the
social standing of these individuals.
It is imperative for any organization or individuals who work with the especially abled persons
should have patient and attentive. They also should poses knowledge about medical and
psychological therapies. The main objective of these interventions is to provide equal
opportunities to the people with special needs. For example, if child is suffering from learning
disabilities, it is important that they receive equal opportunities like any other child. They should
get the chance to receive education in normal schools where extra care will be provided for their
normal growth (Yardley et al., 2015). The approach should be such that they feel more included
in the society and do not feel any less of any other person. In order to achieve that the support
giver should follow the following step of intervention:
 Assessment and identification of the requirements
 Risk evaluation
 Review and development of intervention strategies
 Implementation
Following are the various types of approaches and interventions:
Self Help: Encouraging the differently abled people to be independent is one of the most
effective approaches. Boosting an individual’s morale and self-confidence help them becoming
independent
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Direct Action: Assisting the individual directly with his or her basic tasks like dressing, washing,
eating and other personal chores
Partnership: Collaborating with various organizations who work with the differently abled
people
Evidence based: It is the practices, which have been tried and tested by the other caregivers
Advocacy: The advocacy-based interventions mean the support given to people who are the
victims of any kind of abuse. Generally, woman and child abuse fall into this category. In the
given scenario baby Peter was physically abused by his mother and her boyfriend which
ultimately resulted in his death.
Guardianship: guardianship based intervention is when a person or a family takes responsibility
of the person of specific need fully.
Risk Management: Risk management is one of the most important part of the interventions. In
order to risk management, one needs to take consideration of medical, technological,
psychological or lifestyle therapies (Mai, 2016).
In the given scenario, it can be seen that HL has been suffering from autism and was getting all
kind of medical support in the Bournewood hospital but the hospital has not been able to support
his emotional needs. Whereas Mr. and Mrs. E were able to provide him, a family setting, which
not only made him more independent but also, contributed to the overall improvement of his
emotional and behavioral characteristics.
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3.2. Evaluate the effectiveness of intervention strategies for an individual with specific
need(s).
There are primarily four kinds of interventions that are available, which can be used to help and
support a person with specific need. The four interventions have been explained in the following
section:
 Behavioral Intervention: behavior intervention helps prevent behavioral shortcomings.
Aggressions without provocation, withdrawn nature, attention seeking, and verbal abuse
are few examples of behavioral problems that can be seen in kids as well as in adults. It is
necessary to address the problem at the very beginning. Proper counseling by a
professional, encouraging good behavior rewards for good behavior, better
communication with help in this case (Sallis et al., 2015).
 Developmental Intervention: Developmental interventions are structures to prevent the
main internal developmental areas rather than external behavior of a person. In this, the
counselor, teacher, or parents are advised to work on the individual’s personal interests to
improve his communication, logical reasoning, symbolic thinking and other skills. In the
given scenario, Mr. and Mrs. E have worked towards improving various developmental
skills of HL and ultimately HL learned where his favourite drinks have been kept in the
refrigerator.
 Improving Access to Psychological Therapist: After a certain point, it is imperative to
seek professional help. Along with family and society’s support, it is also important that
the individual receive professional support as and when necessary.
 Cognitive Behavior Therapy: It is a kind of psychosocial intervention. Cognitive behavior
consists of attention, creativity, memory, problem solving, perception and other skills. In
the given scenario, HL has autism. People having autism are normally having limitations
in term of his social skills, verbal and nonverbal communications and have repetitive
behavior. With Cognitive Behavior Therapy HL has been able to overcome his problem
to some extent (Seligman and Darling, 2017).
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3.3. Discuss the potential impact of emerging developments on support for individuals with
specific needs.
The most challenging part of dealing with the persons with specific needs understands their
requirements. Our basic instinct is jumping to help someone who has any kind of difficulty.
However, sometimes it adversely affects the person. Therefore, it is very important that the
caregivers understand the need of the individuals. Fortunately, nowadays the awareness of such
problems has been increasing rapidly. Today, many institutions, corporate organizations,
government agencies are coming forward to spread awareness to help people in specific needs
(Luthans and Doh, 2018). Usually it has been noticed that the people who are suffering from any
kind of disability be it mental or physical, suffer from the lack of self-confidence. Therefore, it is
necessary that the caregiver understand the actual requirement of the individual, in order to
achieve that the caregiver first needs to win the trust of the individual. Today, various
institutions, NGOs and therapists are coming forward to educate the primary care givers as to
how to take care of the individuals. Sometimes, a small incident can affect the individual greatly,
which sometimes proved to be irreversible. It can be also seen that with the parents, teacher,
schoolmates, colleagues are taking initiatives to learn how to conduct themselves in front of the
concerned individuals. In the given scenario, it can be seen that how the sudden detention of HL
by the Bournewood hospital had affected HL both physically and mentally. The years of
relentless work of Mr. and Mrs. E were lost within few months of his stay in the hospital.
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LO4
4.1. Explain different concepts of challenging behavior.
While living in a society every individual needs to follow certain sort of behavior, which is
referred as socially acceptable behavior. However, sometimes behavior of some people does not
follow the standard pattern. Then it is called challenging behavior. Behavior of certain people are
called challenging when it tend to harm themselves or prevent somebody to fulfill some aspects
of their social life (Daly et al., 2015). For example, a kid is suspended from school because of his
aggressive behavior.
Follwing are the few examples of challenging behavior:
 Self-harm: Some people show the tendency of harming themselves such as scratching, eating
harmful things, cutting with sharp things on their bodies etc.
 Aggressive: Some people possess physical or emotional threat to other people like schoolmates,
colleagues, boy/girl friend and other. In their aggression they sometime bite, punch, hit with
objects, throw object to hurt someone. Verbal abuse is also classified as aggression. In the given
scenario, Tracey Connelly, her boyfriend Steven Barker, and Jason Owen have been seen to
possess aggressive behavior, which ultimately killed baby peter.
 Stereotyped: Repetitive movements as rocking, shaking, and head banging, repetitive speech are
called stereotypes challenging behaviors.
 Non-person directed Damage to property, inappropriate sexual behavior, hyperactivity,
stealing, and lack of awareness of danger fall into this category.
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4.2. Describe the potential impact of challenging behavior on health and social care
organizations
Today, there are number of institutions, organizations and social service agencies are working
towards helping people affected by this specific disability. This health and social care agencies
work towards curing the individual as well as protecting them from harming themselves and
other from them (Cabrera et al., 2015). Following are the processes, which a health and social
care organizations follow in order to do the same:
 Identification: It is the first step f their work as the correct identification helps them to
chalk out the strategies in order to help the individual.
 Gaining trust: It is very important hat the individual trusts the health and social care
provider. Otherwise, it will be impossible to assess the magnitude of the problem. Once
the individual starts trusting the caregiver or therapist, the individual starts working with
him instead of opposing the treatment.
 Strategy: This part is very crucial. The caregiver needs to plan minutely as any misstep
can adversely affect the person and stop the improvement al together.
 Implementation: Implementation of right technique at the right time can work wonders.
 Maintain confidentiality: maintaining confidentiality is very crucial in this kind of
individuals. Since the individual trusts the therapist, he or she open ups about intimate
details about themselves. If the confidentiality is not maintained properly, the therapist
may lose the trust of the individual. Moreover, once it is lost, it is impossible to achieve
again.
Nowadays, it can be noticed that the level of patience of any individual is very limited and the
number of people showing challenging behavior is increasing every day. Therefore, It s the
responsibility of the health and social care organizations to follow the above mentioned steps to
avoid any kind of unwanted incidents (Sousa, 2016).
In the given scenario, it can be noticed that, the lack of competency of Haringey Council's
Children & Young People's Service, had contributed in the premature death of Baby Peter. Had
they been more careful, Baby Peter would have survived the abusive behavior of his guardians.
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Though, the head of the organization later removed by the ministry, it could not bring justice to
baby peter.
4.3. Analyse strategies for working with challenging behaviors associated with specific
needs.
In order to support the individuals with challenging behavior associated with specific needs any
caregiver or therapist need to follow specific strategy to avoid any kind of unwanted incidents.
For example, individual with autism can show characteristics of repetitive movements.
Therefore, it becomes necessity for the caregiver to devise a plan to reduce his behavior when
some external or internal aspects trigger it. The firsts step is to find out the root cause of the
challenging behavior in the individual. The next step is to devise a plan in order to eliminate the
factor, which is causing the particular challenging behavior in the individual (Beck et al., 2015).
Sometimes, it can be seen that some external factor-like a person or environment in which the
individual is residing is the trigger for behavior. Therefore, it is necessary to distance him from
that particular person or social environment. It is also possible that the rigger is internal. For
example, the people suffering from autism have tendencies to have anger issue. They become
aggressive without any provocation. In this case, it is imperative to seek professional help like
counseling of the individual to reduce the effect of the trigger. It is also very important that the
person space of the individual have been respected. It is crucial that people around him treat him
equally and his needs are fulfilled with efficiency.
In the given scenario, HL who is suffering from autism becomes terribly disturbed by the sudden
detention by the Bournewood hospital and isolation from his guardian Mr. and Mrs. E.
Therefore, it is imperative that he should be returned to his guardians immediately. If the
authority of Bournewood hospital keep him from his guardians and continues his detention, it
can permanently deteriorates his condition and never improve in future.
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Conclusion:
The above report explains the importance of health, disability, illness and behavior in the context
of health and social care services. It explains how the perception around the people with specific
needs have changed over the time. It has grown slowly but steadily with time. More and more
people are taking initiatives to understand the need and requirements of the people with special
needs. The report also suggests the impact of legislation, social policy, society and culture on the
ways that services are made available for individuals with specific needs. After reading the
above report, one can understand the various needs of the individual. It also explains the current
support system available for the people with mental and physical disabilities. The report also
explains various intervention strategies and its effectiveness. The report also discusses the impact
of various emerging developments on the people with special needs. Lastly, the report provides
information regarding the challenging behavior, its impact on health and social care and various
strategies a caregiver or therapist follows to support individuals with challenging behavior
associated with specific needs.
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