Discuss about the Investigation of Peer Support Workers.
Homelessness is a problem that Australia has had to deal with for many years. There are a large number of Australians who do not have homes. This happens because of the various socio-economic challenges that such people go through. The first reason why there is homelessness is poverty. There are many poor people who do not have money to acquire accommodation or housing facilities. Secondly, homelessness persists because of lack of support. Many people lack where to stay they do not get the necessary support from their family members or relatives. Moreover homelessness has been a problem in the country because of mental illnesses. Some people end up living in the streets because of the mental disorders like trauma and depression (Sharam & Hulse, 2014). Lastly, homelessness is linked to drug abuse. People who are addicted to drugs like alcohol, cocaine, heroin and many others may end up leaving their homes for the streets. Homelessness is not a good thing because it does not benefit the society in any way apart from causing mental distress it is responsible for poor physical health. At the same time it negatively impact on the prosperity of the families, communities and the nation at large (Urbanoski, et al., 2018). For this reason therefore homelessness should be considered as an issue of concern that must be addressed using the necessary measures. Such challenges can be addressed at the cottages and Assessment, Liaison and Early Referral Team (ALERT). Whereas a cottage refers to a special facility that accommodate the homeless and provide them with the healthcare services that they require, ALERT is a program designed for attending to the clients who have complex and urgent medical and psychological needs.
During my time at the cottage I got an opportunity to learn a lot of things about homelessness. I managed to learn all those things because I got an opportunity to interact with homeless people, people who had experienced homelessness and the professionals who deal with homeless people. The first lesson that I learnt is that there are different types of homelessness. The second lesson that I learnt is that homelessness is not only about lacking a roof, but also about lacking basic necessities like food and clothing. At the same time I learnt that homelessness can also be understood from the perspective of healthcare provision. In other words homelessness is equivalent to lack of medical care.
I also learnt that there are many factors that contribute to homelessness. These include poverty, drug abuse, mental illness, as well as other socio-economic factors. First and foremost, homelessness is caused by poverty. There are many poor people who do not have money to acquire accommodation or housing facilities (Lippert & Lee, 2015). Besides, homelessness persists because of lack of support. Many people lack where to stay they do not get the necessary support from their family members or relatives. Moreover homelessness has been a problem in the country because of mental illnesses. Some people end up living in the streets because of the mental disorders like trauma and depression. Finally, homelessness is linked to drug abuse. People who are addicted to drugs like alcohol, cocaine, heroin and many others may end up leaving their homes for the streets.
From the interactions that I had and observations that I made I realized that homelessness is a bad experience because it negatively impacts on human health in many ways. Firstly, it leads to mental illnesses such as depression, Post Traumatic Disorder (PTSD), and stress. These are disorders that affect human health because they deprive the homeless of leading a normal and comfortable life in the society. Although these are common disorders that do affect people, the situation might be worse if it is a homeless person because it makes life extremely difficult for them (Sharam & Hulse, 2014). The cases of a mentally-ill homeless patient should be taken seriously because it is like a double tragedy. It is a double tragedy because already, the homeless are battling serious challenges that can negatively impact on their livers. That is why the homeless should be given a priority whenever any healthcare decisions are made to allocate scarce resources, for instance. Last. But not least, I realized that the problem of homelessness negatively affects human health because it makes the victims vulnerable to acts of stigmatization and discrimination. although the homeless people should always be given a first priority because they have a deserving case, there are many instances where they have been stigmatized and discriminated upon when they seek for medical services (Anderson & Collins, 2014). There are healthcare facilities which have been accused of denying the homeless healthcare services because of a belief that they might not afford such services or are undeserving because they are irresponsible. All these challenges imply that the homeless have become vulnerable to illne4sses and might succumb to them so easily because no one cares for them. Therefore, to provide an ultimate solution to this problem, appropriate measures must be taken by the government and the other concerned stakeholders.
At the Cottage and ALERT facilities, the homeless people are provided with adequate services that they depend on to improve their conditions. Once the homeless are admitted into these facilities, they are provided with all the services which can be relied upon to improve their conditions. However, to achieve all the set goals, the management uses many strategies. The most outstanding strategy that is applied in these facilities is the use of peer support. Peer support is an intervention approach in which a person who has experience in a given problem is used to provide assistance to the clients. In the context of homelessness, a peer support can be applied by involving the people who have had a first-hand experience in homelessness. The people who have an experience in homelessness are used because they have enough knowledge about and can adequately inform the victims and give them enough information about it. Basically, there are three main peer support models used in the cottages.
The first peer support model used in the cottage facilities is called peer workers model. Here, professionals are used to provide assistance to the homeless people. What makes these professionals exceptional is that they must have been victims of homeless. Meaning, at one time in their lifetime, they have been homeless. The homeless workers are used in the support of the homeless clients because of many reasons. Firstly, they are experts who have a sound knowledge on the matters to do with peer support. As professionals, the homeless workers are equipped with the necessary skills that they can use to study, understand, and act upon the various challenges that the homeless have been going through. They are suitable for use in this kind of work since they are experts who are knowledgeable and can use their skills to provide the clients with all the problems that they have (Waalkes, DeCino & Borders, 2018). For example, when it comes to addressing healthcare needs, these peer workers can do it because they have received a specialized training on the causes and treatment for various diseases that these people go through. Besides, the peer workers are used in supporting the homeless because they are familiar with it. Since they have been victims of such a problem, the workers know all the difficulties faced and how to use the best strategies to come out of it. Therefore, by using them, the homeless will not have to struggle anymore because they are served by the people who know the difficulties that they are going through and are committed towards helping them.
The other model that is used in the peer support involves the use of peer-peer strategy. Here, there are no experts who are used in supporting the homeless people. Instead, it is the homeless people themselves who are used to teach other homeless people more about the health-related issues of the homeless. The difference between the two models is that in the peer worker model, only professionals are used in the supporting of the homeless people. However, in the peer-peer model, no professionals are used. Instead, only the people who have had some have been a victim of homelessness are used to provide the necessary support to those who are currently going through such a challenge. Meaning, the only qualification is familiarity with the problem of homelessness. The cottages always apply this strategy because it is appropriate for the homeless people since it gives them a moral support and makes them to believe that homelessness is a problem that can be overcome if appropriate measures are taken (Lee & Schreck, 2005). Those who apply the guidance given by such peers can end up overcoming their homelessness since they might emulate the other people who were once in such a situation, but overcame it.
Apart from the two models, there is also another peer support model that is used in these facilities. This model is done by using professionals who have not been victims of homeless, though they know something about it because it has been faced by one of the people close to them. These could be family members, relatives, friends, colleagues or anyone whom they know at personal level. These people are used to provide peer support because they are professionals who know how to provide the required support to the clients (Armstrong, Owens & Haskett, 2018). At the same time, they are also used in this job because they know someone who had been a victim of harmlessness. Because of this, they might use their skills and experience to guide the homeless and motivate them to deal with it without any fears because it is not a permanent condition.
In Australia, these models are used in providing peer support to the homeless. The cottages have been applying these models because f their effectiveness in creating a behavior a change on the homeless its ability to provide solution to health challenges that the homeless people have been facing (Urbanoski, et al., 2018). In the Australian cottages, preference is given to the formal peer support which basically involves the use of experts who deliver professional support services to those who need it. This model is preferred because it is done by the people who have got the required skills for this particular job. After all, these are people who have faced the same problem at least at one point in their lifetime (Fazel, Geddes & Kushel, 2014). Apart from this, the Australian cottages have been using a peer-peer support model in which they use non-professionals who have been homeless in the past. Each of these models has helped in creating an impact on the homeless people because it comes with a rich narrative of how the peers have been facing the same problem. It also sensitizes the homeless on how they managed to overcome the challenge and be able to lead a good and stress-free life no matter how hard it was (Fitzpatrick, Myrstol & Miller, 2015).
Peer support is a good model that should always be used in providing support to the homeless people in the country. Over the years, the country has been having a large number of homeless people. However, what worries is that these people not only lack a shelter, but also face difficulties in getting access to medical services that they direly need. The situation is worsened by the fact that these homeless people are too exposed to mental disorders such as depression. However, what should be acknowledged is that all these problems can be addressed if appropriate measures are taken (Fitzpatrick, Myrstol & Miller, 2015). Therefore, what needs to be done is to make a right choice on the exact action to take. The healthcare facilities should have a choice on the exact model to use as long as it can help in providing a permanent solution to the problem of homelessness and all its related challenges like mental illness.
As already explained, the two main peer support models used in Australia are worker peer support model and peer-per support model. Each of these models has been favored because it enables the organizations to use the people who are skilled and have a first-hand experience on the problems brought by homelessness. However, I would like to recommend that these two models should not be applied by the cottages because of their weaknesses (Armstrong, Owens & Haskett, 2018). The first reason why I argue in favor of these models is that it might not be possible to get the right people who have been homeless. Although there are many people who have been homeless, not everyone is ready to share their private information because they might perceive it as awkward or unnecessary to do so (O’Toole, Johnson, Aiello, Kane & Pape, 2016). At the same time, it might not be easy to get the homeless people who are willing to volunteer to share their struggles in the right manner. Finally, getting the former homeless and training them on peer support might be cumbersome because it requires a lot of time and money to do so. In this regard, this paper recommends that the Australian cottages should use a different model because it might be more effective than the two discussed here.
This paper recommends that the cottages should not concentrate on the people who have been homeless because it might not be an easy thing to do. Instead, the cottages should look for the services of the people who have not been directly victimized by homelessness. These are people who have indirectly experienced homelessness either by seeing their friends, relatives, colleagues or loved ones go through it (Chamberlain, Johnson & Robinson, 2014). The reason why these people should be used to provide peer support to the homeless is because they have enough knowledge about it because they know how it affects the people. The advantage of this model is that it can give the cottages an opportunity to rely on readily available staff since it is easier to get such people instead of coming across those who have been personally homeless in the past. For example, if a social worker is use to provide peer support to the homeless, he might do an excellent job because such experts have been directly dealing with the homeless people in the course of their duties (Ellison, et al., 2016). Hence, even if they have not been homeless, these people can rely on their past experience to provide useful and life-changing support to the homeless accommodated at the cottages.
There are many reasons why the Australian collages should adopt this new model. In the first place, it can give them an opportunity to enjoy the services of the readily available personnel at their disposal. It might be easier to get a social worker who has handled the homeless people than getting a healthcare provider who has been homeless. This makes the model advantageous because it saves time for the management (Fazel, Geddes & Kushel, 2014). Time is a useful and scarce resource that must be sparingly used because it means a lot for the success of an organization. The other benefit that the cottages might enjoy if they adopt this model is that they might save on the costs of operations. As already hinted, utilizing the services of a homeless professional might be a costly affair because for such people to be as productive as expected, they must be in possession of the right training. However, this is not always possible because of the inadequacy of resources. Therefore, to overcome such a challenge, the management of the colleges should not spend their entire fortune training the homeless (Nyamathi, Salem, Zhang, Farabee, Hall, Khalilifard & Leake, 2015). Instead, they should only seek for the services of the people who have been indirectly affected by homelessness or the social workers who have been dealing with the homeless. They can be resourceful whenever their services are sought.
Homelessness is a real challenge that the Australians have been going through in life. The homeless is one of the marginalized groups in the country. Homelessness is an issue of concern because it affects individuals, families, community, and the nation at large (Arnaud, et al., 2016). The exposure of individual Australians to homelessness causes mental illnesses which end up becoming a burden to the individual homeless people and the society in general. That is the reason why the cottages have been put in place (Yoon, Lo, Gehlert, Johnson & O’Toole, 2017). The cottages are, therefore, suitable facilities because they are ideal places in which the homeless can seek for comfortable and personalized medical support whenever necessary.
According to the literature review, the homeless people should be considered as a priority because they are living in deplorable conditions that affect their growth and development. Lack of housing facilities can be disastrous because it hinders people from leading a normal life because of the mental ill-health that is linked to it. If it were not for its negativity, homelessness would not have made people vulnerable to depression, Post-Stress Traumatic Disorder, and anxiety (Hurst, Gibbon & Nurse, 2016). However, all these have become part and parcel of the homeless people because they cannot do anything about it. However, as demonstrated in the review, there is still hope because the problem can be addressed. For this to be accomplished, the facilities do adopt the worker peer model and peer-peer model (Scutella, Johnson, Moschion, Tseng & Wooden, 2013). These models have been fruitful because they enable the facilities to use information from the people who have been personally victimized by the problem to assist those who have been homeless in their midst. Peer support is essential for the homeless because it provides them with the requisite inspiration, hope, and encouragement that they need to apply for them to overcome the problems that they go through.
References
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