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10 J. Soc. Welfare & Fam. L. 1 (1988)

handle is hein.journals/jnlosclwl10 and id is 1 raw text is: Points of View By John McMaster Most of us have had some experience of case conferences. Such meetings are legion in social work, law, education, medicine and probably a host of other areas. When I say that most of us have had some experience I refer to direct involvement, not necessarily in a professional capacity. Take medicine for example. I can think of two occasions when I was the reason for case confer- ences in a hospital because I was the patient. But perhaps direct involvement is a misnomer since I was not present at the case conference. A parent friend recounted to me recently his great concern, not to mention apprehension, frustration and anger, regarding the assessment of his son's needs by the Educational Authority in the light of the 1981 Education Act. Why such a reaction? Because of exclusion from the case conferences which ensued and the consequent parental feelings of hostility and a reluctance to co-operate. Whilst the point at issue would seem straightforward (i.e. inclusion or exclusion of client, parent or child) the more I have pondered the problem the more complex it has become. Not least in this respect is the discrepancy of view regarding the purpose of the case conference which a quick reading of the relevant research (quick because there is little of it) soon establishes. Since I believe that the case conference should be a critically important event and epitomise the distillation of professional practice at the highest level, but that in reality this is frequently a myth, I shall elaborate. First, the terms themselves. The salient features regarding case would seem to be a set of circumstances, conditions, or series of developments constituting a problem and where reference is usually to one person although others will often be involved. Conference I believe to be the act of consulting, usually in a for- mal manner in which an interchange of views, discussions and deliberations take place with the objective of making a decision about an individual. The deliber- ations referred to will always involve verbal and written material. Secondly, the function and outcome. The case conference should result in one outcome, namely, effective decision making in the interests of the person at the centre of the deliberations, the client. In order to achieve this outcome a number of functions need to be fulfilled. The major functions are to: examine, describe, co-ordinate, monitor, analyse, assess and evaluate. If these functions are undertaken appropriately then there is a collective professional responsi- bility which ensures that effective decisions have been made. These effective decisions must be in the interests of the client or assist the client to make his or her own decisions. The evidence at my disposal suggests that social work in par- ticular has serious inadequacies with regard to the above view of the case con- ference and that much needs attention. The issue of whether the client should attend the case conference or not would seem to merit merely a straight yes or no depending on viewpoint. Reality is that the issue becomes more complex as a result of various interpretations of involvement or participation. The argument for the client being involved would seem indisputable until one queries the degree of involvement and what this would entail. Such areas as access to information, verbal and/or written con- 1

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