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Hoer_openlearn last modified by Gillian Stevens (t0022212) on 14 July 2010 5:17:27 PM

Health and Social Care

(external link: http://openlearn.open.ac.uk/course/category.php?id=6)

Available Resources

Alcohol and human health

What impact does alcohol have on the body? From a ‘hangover’ to cirrhosis this unit looks at the harmful effects of alcohol both in the short and long term.

Care relationships

To set up a care relationship that works well is a delicate matter, whether you are at the giving or the receiving end. In this unit we explore the very varied meanings of care relationships and how these meanings arise. Millions of care relationships are going on as you read this, and each carries its own particular meanings for those involved. But where have all those people picked up their ideas of how to relate to each other? How does any of us know where to begin?

Caring: A Family Affair

Care is needed at all stages of life. This unit makes care in the family its focus because the overwhelming majority of care, including health care, is supplied in families, much of it in private, much of it unnoticed and unremarked upon. The meaning of the term (informal carer) and the word (care) itself are explored.

Caring in hospitals

This unit considers the type of care offered in hospitals, using Leeds General Hospital as a case study. The unit looks at the people who have roles within the hospital, how they interact with each other and patients and what they consider to be 'care'. The different approaches and contributions to care by doctors and nurses are explored and patients give their perspective on the care they receive.

Diversity and difference in communication

Interpersonal communication in health and social care services is by its nature diverse. As a consequence, achieving good or effective communication – whether between service providers and service users, or among those working in a service – means taking account of diversity, rather than assuming that every interaction will be the same. This unit explores the ways in which difference and diversity impact on the nature of communication in health and social care services.

Exploring sport online: Athletes and efficient hearts

We all know that the heart is very important but what exactly does the heart do? Why is the blood so important? What functions do the lungs perform? In this unit, we will try to provide at least a basic understanding so we can answer these questions and begin to understand why knowing about the heart is important for all sports people. Before that we will take a look at the human body.

Finding information in health and lifestyle

This unit will help you to identify and use information in health and lifestyle, whether for your work, study or personal purposes. Experiment with some of the key resources in this subject area, and learn about the skills which will enable you to plan searches for information, so you can find what you are looking for more easily. Discover the meaning of information quality, and learn how to evaluate the information you come across. You will also be introduced to the many different ways of organising your own information, and learn how to reference it properly in your work.

Improving aerobic fitness

Aerobic fitness is integral to successful sports performance and to maintaining good health. But what sort of exercise should you be doing to develop your aerobic fitness? This unit will help you to answer this question by introducing you to principles of aerobic exercise prescription.

Lennox Castle Hospital

This unit looks at the history of institutions in the twentieth century, starting with a case study of Lennox Castle Hospital. It tries to make sense of the history of Lennox Castle, and of institutional life in general, through testimony of those who experienced institutions as inmates and as nurses, as well as through Erving Goffman's medel of the 'total institution'. It examines the social bases of segragation, the professionalisation of staff in asylums and institutions, and campaigns for change in the treatment of those segragated from society in institutions.

Living with death and dying

This unit will explore how knowledge and beliefs about death and encounters with death affect people’s lives. It will also examine the concept of a ‘good death’ from an individual perspective in order to enhance the quality of dying.

Mental health practice: Bonnyrigg

Although society's attitude toward mental illness has improved, discrimination and misconceptions surrounding those affected are still prevalent. This unit explores a number of issues relating to mental health practice, including the difference between mental health and mental illness, and the discrimination that can arise when people experience some form of mental distress.

The boundaries of care

In this unit, we are going to look at a number of situations which put a strain on the idea that caring is just 'being ordinary', including times when people are giving intimate care. In these special circumstances, since the normal rules do not apply, we have to develop a set of special rules to guide practice.

The limits of primary care

In this unit we explore questions of access to community services. To make what might be quite a dry task more challenging we use a fictionalised case study of two people for whom access to community services is particularly problematic. Jim and Marianne are both long-term heroin addicts. Additional problems associated with their addiction are homelessness and physical illness. Their situation raises both practical questions, about how services can be accessed, and moral questions, about entitlement to resources when their problems can be regarded as at least in part self-inflicted.

The meaning of home

This unit looks at the way people identify and become attached to places, buildings and objects. It also analyses how this attachment can impact on personal well-being. Understanding this is important in assessing the care people of all ages need and how this care should be delivered.

Understanding health - taster materials

Alcohol abuse, healthy living and Alzheimer’s disease all regularly hit the headlines. This unit will take a brief look at these issues.

Ageing and disability: transitions into residential care

Moving into a care home can have a profound emotional impact on an individual – just the anticipation of residential care is one of the biggest sources of fear for the elderly. This unit discusses the role of social workers and care staff in supporting individuals through the transition, and how residential environments affect quality of life.

Bedfordshire Mencap

This unit enables you to hear some of the founding members of the Bedfordshire Mencap organisation talk about how the organisation was established and the wide range of support services it offers. The work that individuals exerted to promote change is a source of pressure towards the ideal that parents should be supported in their task of bringing up children with learning difficulties.

Care transactions

Arrangements for care and support which people manage for themselves or have organised for them privately or informally tell us something about the shifting borders between funded and non-funded care, between health and social care, and between paid and unpaid care work. They also demonstrate how the reality of the mixed economy of care is played out in the arrangements which people make for care and support in their own households.

Challenging ideas in mental health

Take a new and different look at mental health. This unit invites you to think differently about life's dilemmas by taking account of the views of all concerned, especially people experiencing mental distress. It explores ideas and practice in mental health, and will appeal to a wide range of people.

Death and medicine: postponement and promise

This unit asks the reader to consider the experience of grief and bereavement and in particular the extent to which grieving people need professional help. The unit considers the evidence for the effects of grief and the extent to which current ways of responding are helpful.

Experiences of assessment

This unit is about assessing need. It is important to understand and hear about people's experiences of being assessed by health or social welfare professionals so that more sensitive responses to those with care and support needs can be developed. We interviewed three people about their experiences of assessment. Having done that, we then asked a social worker and an occupational therapist to listen to the interviews and to comment on them.

Health is everywhere: unravelling the mystery of health

This unit considers two ideas: that health is an ever-present factor in our lives, and that health is something difficult to define. But how can we say that health is everywhere if it is so mysterious? How do we recognise health if it so difficult to define? There are no easy answers to these questions! In this unit we explore this paradox, not just because it is a fascinating dilemma but because understanding health in all its multifaceted complexity is a prerequisite to working for health in imaginative, creative and useful ways, in both our private and our public lives.

Issues in complementary and alternative medicine

Why are so many people now turning to complementary and alternative medicine and why do approaches to complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) raise such controversy? This unit explores the following three key areas: ‘Why people use complementary and alternative medicine’, ‘Critical issues in the therapeutic relationship’ and ‘Ethics in complementary and alternative medicine’.

The Adur Carers Project

This unit will help you to understand how people feel about being carers, and what their main concerns are.

The medicalised context of bereavement

This unit helps you to explore the extent to which death and dying in western societies are medical events and what aspects of death and dying might be neglected as a consequence. The unit covers the way that such things as medicine provide the context of the experiences associated with the end of life.

Managing to meet service users' needs

Frontline managers are responsible for gathering service user views on their needs. Whose views should be taken into account? How do managers gather views? This unit helps you consider ways of getting feedback from service users, and shows the inclusive approach of a manager of a voluntary sector mental health service.