Social Work Practices for Young People with Complex Needs: An Integrative Review
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Social Work Practices for Young People with Complex Needs: An Integrative Review Anna‑Lena Almqvist1 · Kitty Lassinantti2 Published online: 14 December 2017 © The Author(s) 2017. This article is an open access publication
Abstract The aim of this integrative review is to investigate research of social work practices for adolescents and young adults with complex needs. The research questions are: What are the major themes in studies of practices for young people with complex needs? How do studies suggest that complex needs can be met in ways that are beneficial for young people? A young person with complex needs is in this review defined as an adolescent or young adult who, due to mental ill-health in combination with different types of social vulnerabilities, is receiving assistance from multiple welfare services. Searches were conducted in seven databases. These searches resulted in a sample of 1677 records, published 2007–2016, which in the screening process were reduced to 24 publications, all peer-reviewed articles. The participants in the studies in the articles consisted of young people, parents and professionals from mainly Anglo-Saxon countries. The articles were analyzed with qualitative summative content analysis. Three empirically generated themes were found in studies of work practices targeting young people with complex needs: collaboration-, relationship- and empowerment-oriented practices. In conclusion, the practices contain a wide variety of features, but with the joint aim of acknowledging young people’s needs. The results can be used by practitioners and policymakers to further the development of services for youth with mental ill-health and social vulnerabilities, who use multiple welfare services. Keywords Complex needs · Empowerment · Integrative review · Relationship · Social work practices · Young people
Introduction An extensive number of young people in Western countries are facing severe difficulties, due to mental ill-health (Hagqvist, 2011; Palmer, 2012) in combination with social vulnerability. These young people are often referred to as having “complex needs”. Complex needs is an elusive concept (Hood, 2015) and there are large variations in what kind of problems and needs someone labeled as a person with complex needs may have. This concerns young people having mental ill-health with or without a psychiatric diagnosis, who are also exposed to various and multiple risk factors * Anna‑Lena Almqvist anna‑[email protected] 1
Division of Social Work, School of Health, Care and Social Welfare, Mälardalen University, Box 605, 631 05 Eskilstuna, Sweden
Division of Sociologi, School of Health, Care and Social Welfare, Mälardalen University, Box 883, 721 23 Västerås, Sweden
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such as difficulties in completing education (De Ridder et al., 2013), unemployment (Egan, Daley & Delaney, 2015; Lager & Bremberg, 2009, Ose & Jensen, 2017), out-of-home care (Roesch-Marsh, 2014; Vinnerljung & Sallnäs, 2008) substance abuse and juvenile delinquency (Shook et al., 2011). The concept compl
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