Interprofile practices: ensuring safety in the long-term care system (on the example of the Volgograd region)

Abstract

The long-term care system includes diverse specialists who organize long-term care activities and provide services to elderly and disabled people in need of care. Our focus is on interprofile practices that are created in the long-term care system in order to provide high-quality and safe services to the population. The purpose of the article is to identify the features of interprofile practices in the aspect of ensuring safety in long-term care. In the long-term care system, safety is understood as a way to protect the health and well-being of the elderly and disabled, creating conditions to improve the quality of life of citizens in need of care. It is relevant to create safe work for care professionals in order to prevent their professional burnout in long-term care. The article uses the analysis of scientific literature and the results of expert interviews with managers and employees of social service centers of the Volgograd region (N=27, Volgograd region, January – February 2022). The fundamental theory for the study of interprofile interactions of specialists as organized practices is the theory of structuration by E. Giddens. The features of interprofile practices that are reproduced by subjects of long-term care include: versatility, balance of social services and medical care, the technological basis for the interaction of specialists, ensuring safety in the process of long-term care. In the Volgograd region, a mechanism is being built to ensure the safety of elderly people and care professionals in need of care, technologies are being used that integrate the efforts of medical workers and specialists in the field of social services, the creation of which contributes to improving the quality of services for the elderly and disabled. However, not all social service centers in the Volgograd Region use the brigade method and establish cooperation practices between medical professionals and social service specialists, whose integration ensures the safety of both providers and recipients of services.