Public mistrust of those in authority and failings of public organisations frame disputes over attribution of responsibility between individuals and systems. Exemplified with examples, including the Aberfan disaster, the death of Baby P, and Mid Staffs Hospital, this book explores parallel conflicts over access to information and privacy. The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) allows access to information about public organisations but can be in conflict with the Data Protection Act, protecting personal information. Exploring the use of the FOIA as a research tool, Sheaff offers a unique contribution to the development of sociological research methods, and debates connected to privacy and secrecy in the information age. This book will provide sociologists and social scientists with a fresh perspective on contemporary issues of power and control.
The author's agenda in writing the book was to provoke critical thinking and awareness and to move beyond the simplistic rhetoric that so often characterizes much of public debate on health care matters.I have no doubt that he has achieved these aims...and more." Sociology Volume 43, Number 3, June 2009 “Sociology & Health Care is easy to read and offers an introduction into selected, but key areas, of the sociology of health and illness. It is a useful book for health care students as well as health care workers who are interested in the social aspects of their work, their job and how it all fits into the wider society.” Sociological Research Online Are patients ‘customers’? What does this mean for the patient-practitioner relationship? What should the relationship be between expert knowledge and our own experiences when dealing with health and illness? Do people who are better off get better access to health care? Debates about the future of health care bring questions about patient choice, paternalism and inequalities to the fore. This book addresses some of the sociological issues surrounding these questions including: The social distribution of knowledge The basis of professional power Sources of social inequalities in health The ability of health care services to address these issues The book provides suggestions and examples of how sociological concepts and insights can be used to help think about important contemporary issues in health care. For that reason, it has a practical as well as academic purpose, contributing to improvement of the quality of interaction between patients and practitioners. The core themes running throughout the book are inequalities in health and the rise of chronic disease, with particular attention being given to psycho-social models of illness which locate individual experiences within wider social relationships. Sociology and Health Care is key reading for student nurses and those on allied health courses, and also appeals to a wide range of professionals who are interested in current debates in health and social care.
Public mistrust of those in authority and failings of public organisations frame disputes over attribution of responsibility between individuals and systems. Exemplified with examples, including the Aberfan disaster, the death of Baby P, and Mid Staffs Hospital, this book explores parallel conflicts over access to information and privacy. The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) allows access to information about public organisations but can be in conflict with the Data Protection Act, protecting personal information. Exploring the use of the FOIA as a research tool, Sheaff offers a unique contribution to the development of sociological research methods, and debates connected to privacy and secrecy in the information age. This book will provide sociologists and social scientists with a fresh perspective on contemporary issues of power and control.
The shift to managed markets has meant that whilst planners and purchasers of health and social services seek information on needs, managers who provide these services seek information on performance and response. Market research contributes to both. This text is a comprehensive and rigorous introduction to the relevance, planning and management of market research in the areas of health and social care that have developed in Britain and most other industrialised countries. It features: * an explanation of how managed markets provide the context for market research * a comprehensive guide to choosing the appropriate survey method * recommendations for commissioning, monitoring and implementing results * practical advice on producing successful student projects * a comparative international perspective. Intended for managers and students of public sector management and marketing, this outstanding book contains instruction on research methods, practical advice for managers and professionals on how to commission, monitor and implement the results of market research, and an excellent selection of case studies.
Professions have long provided a dependable body of expertise that organisations have relied upon to fulfil goals. Issues around equality and diversity alongside challenges to expert knowledge in the neo-liberal era have created profound challenges for this type of worker, even while creating opportunities for newer varieties of expert labour to establish themselves as professionals. This shortform book provides a critical synthesis of the current state of the field from an international perspective. It highlights the key opportunities and challenges for the professions and professionalism within both the public and private sectors as a field of research, practice and policy. The first half of the book deals with the comparative history, theories and inequalities of the professions. This provides a basis for our understanding of how the professions have had to adapt and how governance, management and leadership have come to shape the emerging and evolving models of professions and professionalism. The book draws on case studies and through its analysis illustrates the organisational and sociological dimensions of the field. This book will be of interest to scholars, academics and students in the fields of business, management and sociology, especially those conducting research and studies around the professions and professionalism.
Until now, research has given us only a limited understanding of how managers actually make sense of and apply management knowledge; how networks of interaction amongst managers help or hinder processes of knowledge diffusion and the sharing of best practice; and how these processes are all influenced both by the organisations in which managers act and by the professional communities of practice they belong to. Managing Modern Healthcare fills these important gaps in our understanding by drawing upon an in-depth study of management networks and practice in three healthcare organisations in the UK. It draws from the primary research a number of important and grounded lessons about how management networks develop and influence the spread of management knowledge and practice; how management training and development relates to the needs of managers facing challenging conditions; and how those conditions are themselves shaping the nature of management in healthcare. This book reveals how managers in practice are responding to the many contemporary challenges facing healthcare (and the NHS in particular) and how they are able or not to effectively exploit sources of knowledge, learning and best practice through the networks of practice they engage in to improve healthcare delivery and healthcare organisational performance. Managing Modern Healthcare makes a number of important theoretical contributions as well as practical recommendations. The theoretical and empirical contributions the book makes relate to wider work on networks and networking, management knowledge, situated learning/communities of practice, professionalization/professional identity and healthcare management more generally. The practical contribution comes in the form of recommendations for healthcare management practitioners and policy makers that are intended to impact upon and help enhance healthcare management delivery and performance.
This unique book enhances our understanding of the links between professions, the state and the market – and their implications for the public in terms of professional practice. In so doing, the book adopts a neo-Weberian perspective, in which professions are seen as a form of exclusionary social closure based on legal boundaries established by the state. To illustrate the overarching theme, the book considers how healthcare in general, and medicine in particular as a form of professional work, is organized in public and private arenas in three societies with different socio-political philosophies - namely, Britain, the United States and Russia. As such, it examines the varying extent to which the development of independent professional organizations has been enhanced or restricted in public, as compared to more privatized social contexts. The comparative perspective adopted in this book thereby provides insight into the organization of professional work in different contexts and the all-important effects of this on delivery to the public. This book will be of particular interest to scholars, researchers and students of Management, Public Policy and Health Care.
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