Evidence-based Practice for Pre and Post MSWs  Tags: social_work evidence-based_practice social_sciences  

PRE-MSW

MSW: Evidence-based Social Work, focusing on library resources at the University of Michigan Libraries in 

    Children and Youth I  (cultural competency development for child welfare workers)

    Children and Youth II (health disparity)

    Multicultural Social Work

      Racial and Ethnic Health Disparities

    Social Work Practice in Mental Health

    Social Work Practice in Health Promotion and Disease Prevention

Post-MSW

Information Literacy Competencies for Professional Social Workers, focusing on free Internet resources, suggests strategies for staying informed in the practice area of  Substance Abuse.

How will social workers maintain "best practice" over the course of their careers? There are many trends that will move the field in the direction of evidenced-based social work, according to Barry R. Cournoyer (2004, p. 2-3):

• Legislation mandates greater professional accountability; malpractice lawsuits are a growing concern; and court decisions uphold professional legal responsibility for outcomes of services.
• Managed health care systems provide incentives for practice-effective research studies.
• Advocacy groups grow stronger in the Internet Age.
• More outcome-based funding strategies are required.

Presentation objectives are to:

• Introduce concepts of evidence-based practice
  • Hierarchy of Research Methods
  • Steps in Evidence-based Practice
    • Formulate clear clinical practice or program questions in social work
    • Formulate productive searches to improve probability of finding practice-relevant information
    • Find secondary literature (if available) in subject-based library databases (systematic reviews, meta-analysis, etc.)
• Introduce Refworks and Protocols to use with Refworks in library databases

"In social work, most agree that EBP is a process involving creating an answerable question based on a client or organizational need, locating the best available evidence to answer the question, evaluating the quality of the evidence as well as its applicability, applying the evidence, and evaluating the effectiveness and efficiency of the solution. EBP is a process in which the practitioner combines well-researched interventions with clinical experience, ethics, client preferences, and culture to guide and inform the delivery of treatments and services." NASW Evidence-Based Practice

Cournoyer, B.R. (2004). The Evidence-based social work skills book. Boston: MA: Allyn and Bacon.

NASW Evidence-Based Practice http://www.socialworkers.org/research/naswResearch/0108EvidenceBased/default.asp

If you were exempt from foundation courses and want to brush up on your Information Literacy Skills see

Community Profile (SW560)
(Problem/need/opportunity and population affected)

Pollicy Researcher Tutorial (SW530)

Hall, J.C. (2008). A practitioner's application and deconstruction of evidence-based practice.  Familes in Society: The Journal of Contemporary Social Sciences.  89(3) 385-393.

Staller, K. M. (2006). Railroads, runaways, & reseachers: Returning evidence rhetoric to its practice base.  Qualitative Inquiry.  12(3), 503-522.

PROS        

Many Social Work programs are modeling their curriculum on Evidence-based Practice:

CONS