To be treated in a dignified way:
If our dignity is taken away, we lose our self-importance and can feel Cheapened and dishonoured. Health and care workers who identify service users’ dignity show that they realize their need for self-respect. They also show that they value service users’ sense of what is accurate, their way of doing things and their way of presenting themselves. Health and care workers who identify service user’s dignity show that they value their need for self-esteem they also show that they value service user’s sense of what is correct, their way of doing things and their way of presenting themselves.
Being treated with dignity is when the opposite person you are speaking to treats you with dignity and makes sure that he/she is not disrespecting you in any way. If someone treats you with dignity then this also gives your self esteem a boast. If someone treats you with dignity you will feel freer to talk to and interact with them because you know that they are treating in a polite manner and they will definitely show respect to you and they will never disrespect you in any way. A really good example of this could be that the service user has no dignity and she is always ignored in care setting because everyone is treated equally she has no choice in what type of breakfast she wants to eat in the morning, because all the other service users need to eat egg on toast, with juice so does she. The service user is not given a choice because her choice does not really matter, what matters is that the employees need to treat each individual equally and that’s what they doing.
To be protected from danger and harm:
As an individual you have a right to being protected from each and every harm which may come in your way. Danger and harm is a law which protects you and makes sure that you as an individual are always safe and you are looked after in a good way. This can also involve you being safe when you’re at home, school or socializing with your friends. Being protected from danger and harm can also involve you being protected physically. For example if you are physically being abused by somebody and the marks are extremely visible by your GP. You should definitely explain the situation to your GP and make sure that your GP is taking some sort of action to protect from being harmed even further this is called protected from danger and harm.
To be treated as an individual:
As a individual you have the right to be treated individually and you also have the right to be treated and seen as a individual because you as a person are different to any other person in this world. There can be no one in this world who just exactly the same as you and there can never be because you are yourself and no one else can be you. The employee should make sure that he/she deals with your case individually and he/she should also make sure that they don’t relate or compare your situation to any other patient because no one in this world can have the exact same problem as you. It’s just not possible. Every single individual has a right to be treated as an individual for example we need our own space were we sit alone. We need a space where we always do our homework. We need space to think about our life and where life is taking us to. We also need others to see us differently from anyone else. We also need others to look at us as a individual and not compare us with anyone else because we are ourselves and no one can be compared with each other because each and every individual in this is different from each other. Being treated as an individual this can be done by the employees for example if a client needs to see their GP for any reason. You need to make sure that the client is alone and that the client is not feeling under pressure from anyone for them to hide anything. If the client is alone then he/she will feel more open and they will be able to talk to the GP more openly and more calmly. They will not feel shy to say anything because they know that what they say at that moment is going to stay between them and the GP. They know that even though his/her friends or family have accompanied them to go to the GP with. They know that their friends or family will not find out in any way what so ever what the client has been telling their GP. Some individuals are also stereotype for examples they are stereotype with age groups, race and also gender. Stereotyping happens when we think that everyone in a group is the same in every way, for example that all aged people or all disabled people are the same. Assuming that everyone in a group is the same in every way is too much of a sweeping statement and nearly always untrue. Being treated as an individual also means that someone looking at you as yourself. Someone referring to you as yourself. Being treated as a individual also means a GP looking at you in a unique he/she will look at you as yourself, your case will be completely different from any other patient.
To be able to communicate with preferred methods:
The employee should be able to communicate effectively with the client because using effective communication skills will show that the employee is ready to listen to what the client has to say and the employee is not going to be ignoring what the client has just said. For example if a employee went to clinic and she was telling the GP about her medical conditions , and the GP started looking around the room instead of listening to what the patient has just said. The patient will feel disrespected and the patient would not really want to talk about their medical conditions because they feel as the GP is not interested about their medical health. To show respect and to also show that you are using effective communication you could use the following communication skills:
Tone of voice: Is a way someone can say something which would hurt or make some one really happy. Tone of voice can also affect how a person might feel for example if a person is feeling really upset he/she might just take their anger out on the wrong person and make the tone of voice go up really loud. This will upset the person they are trying to take their anger out on.
Pace: Is when you talk fast or slow the pace you speak at. If you take to fast the person you are talking to might not be able to understand what you are trying to say. If you talk to slowly then the person you are speaking to might feel very bored and not want to listen to what you are saying.
Body language: How you present yourself, the way you move and also the way you talk. Body language can also be what you where, the types of cloths you wear can sometimes tell other people what type of a person you actually are.
Posture: The way you sit, stand and the way walk your style of walking. Basically the way you move and the way you move your body parts such as your hand, legs or even the way you look at someone.
Facial Expression: Expression implies a revelation about the characteristics of a person, a message about something internal to the expresser.
Pitch: is how high or low your voice sounds.
Sensory contact: when you touch a person to get their attention.
The codes of conducts:
Protect the rights and promote the interests of service users and carers:
This includes the workers at the service to:
- Respecting individuality
- Supporting service users to control their own life
- Respecting and maintaining equal opportunities
- Diversity
- Dignity
- Privacy
Establish and maintain the trust and confidence of service users:
This includes the workers at the service to:
- Maintain confidentiality
- Use effective communication skills
- Honour commitments and agreements
- Declaring conflicts of interest and also keep to the policies about accepting gifts
Uphold Public trust and confidence in social care services:
This includes the workers at the service to:
- Care workers must not abuse, neglect or exploit service users
- They should not place themselves, services users and their colleagues at any risks by misbehaving.
Promote the independence of service users while protecting them from danger and harm:
This includes the workers at the service to:
- Maintain rights
- Challenge, report any inappropriate behaviour
- Follow the safe practice
- Follow the health and safety regulations
Respect the rights of service users while seeking to ensure that their behaviour does not allow them to harm themselves or other people:
This includes the workers at the service to:
- Recognise the right to takes risks
- Follow the risk assessment policies
- Minimise any risks
- Make sure that others are informed about the risk assessment policy.
Be accountable for the quality of the work and take responsibility for maintaining and improving your knowledge and skills:
This includes the workers at the service to:
- Meeting the service standards
- Maintaining appropriate records
- Inform the employer of personal difficulties: seek assistance and also cooperate with colleagues.
- Recognise your responsibility for delegated work
- Respect the roles of others
- Undertake the relevant training.
To be allowed to access to information about themselves:
- Service users might their information to be only shared with them and no one else because they might want others to find out about their medical health. Even if the employee wants to let the service user’s carers to know the service user might not even want their carers to know because they might feel that the carer cannot keep such a confidential matter to themselves.
- The service might not like the fact someone other than them knows about their medical conditions and they might feel that they also hugely lack in self esteem because of the fact that some who they are not really close knows about their medical condition. This medical condition might be really private and maybe the service does not want to share it with anyone at all.
- The service can also be put at risk physically because just in case an enemy wants to find personal information such as the service user’s address and so on. If they do get access to these type of information they could physically harm the service user that why there is the data protection act and no employee is allowed to give out any information about the service user unless the service user themselves have given the employee permission to do so.
- The data protection is one the four legislations of this country and each and every care setting needs to follow this legislation because if they do not follow it they are breaking one of the government laws. In conclusion breaking the government law is a crime and the person who is breaking the law can be jailed for doing this.
GSCC for social care:
- Respect the patient or client as an individual:
You should always respect and treat the client as a individual because each and every individual has a right to be treated individually and also be given respect towards. If the GP gives the patients the right amount of respect and also treats the patient individually. This will build the patients self esteem and the patient will feel much freer to talk to the GP about his/her medical condition.
- Obtain constant before you give any treatment or care
Make sure that the patient knows about the treatment which is being given to her and also make sure that the patient has also agreed with this treatment taking place. If the patient does not give their consent the employee is not allowed at any circumstances to along with the treatment because the patient does not know about it.
- Cooperate with others in a the team
Make sure that you as an employee cooperate well with other workers who are a member of your team. You should for example take their opinions about certain cases and you don’t understand what should be done in any situation, you should definitely consult another doctor.
- Protect confidential information
You as a worker should make sure that your client’s information is not being spread out in any manner and you should make sure that your client’s information stays private without any unknown person finding out about your clients medical problems.
- Maintain your professional knowledge and competence
- Be trustworthy
- Act to identify and minimise the risk to patients and clients
Workers Responsibility
The workers have many different responsibilities towards their clients such the worker needs to talk to the patient nicely in order to find out what exactly is wrong with the patient. If the GP is being rude and not really listening the patient would not really want to share their medical problems with the GP because they might feel the GP does not really care. This will also have a effect on the patients dignity and self esteem. The worker should also be patent with the client because sometimes some clients find it difficult to open up and actually speak to the GP simply because they feel embarrassed to talk about their medical problems. In this case the GP should use effective communication skills with the client such as good body language, effective eye contact. The GP tone of voice should also be nice and clear so the patient can hear everything which is being said by the GP. The GP should also give the patient privacy when they want to get changed because the patient will not want to get undressed in front of an unknown person because this will have a effect on their self esteem. They would prefer to be given some privacy while changing because they would not really want someone to be looking at them while they are getting changed; the client might take this in an offensive way and might not want to be treated by that doctor. You should either get out of the room or just turn the curtains so you cannot see the client getting changed. You should also give privacy to patients when they are talking to people on the phone, and also when the patients are with visitors. You should also be patient with the client if the client is having difficulties to speak the same language as them. Normally people have difficulties speaking English and they find it difficult to communicate with them because of this. The GP can overcome this problem because the GP can bring in an interpreter and make sure that the patient understands just exactly what is being said.
Examples on how Workers Promote Rights
People who work as health and social workers need to develop skills such as active listening, effective communication and also make sure that you are understood by the people you are speaking to, doing this means that the workers need to do the following things:
When the client is trying to explain what exactly is wrong with the them the GP should not interrupt
because if the GP interrupts the client will take this as being rude because interrupting while someone else is speaking is taken as being really rude. The GP should first listen to everything which is being said and then give his/her opinion to the client. When you are in a ward you should always be quiet because the patient might want to go to sleep and if you are making lots and lots of noise the patients can’t go to sleep and this could also have an effect on their health. Make sure that you have understood what exactly has happened to the patient and also make sure that you are using effective communication skills to help you communicate really well with the client. Also use very good body language and ask the patient open and closed questions in order to find out more about the patient. Make sure that you say things like “Yes I understand what you are trying to say” this will reassure the patient and the patient will also feel that yes my GP has understood what i am trying to say and he/she will be very satisfied and they will also feel that their illness can be cured by the help of their GP. After the person has finished what they have to say then repeat what they have just said and also make sure that what you have repeated is right. Ask the patient if what you have just said is right. Also make sure that they have understood what you are trying to say. Make sure that they have understood about the things which they have to do in order to cure themselves. Make sure that you don’t give the patient any opinions or suggestions which is not at all relevant to the case
Some people cannot communicate with others by speaking so they use other techniques to speak for example: They need to speak with the help of sign language and they need you to listen to them effectively because they are more dependent on others and they need others to help them communicate effectively with the help of sign language and so on. There are other techniques such as writhing things down and also drawing pictures and showing photos to let the person know about what the person is talking about. With people who are deaf they can also use these techniques because it would be very handy for them to communicate. People with hearing difficulties can also be helped by using techniques such as writhing things down.