« Previous | Contents | Next »
Listen
CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION TO THE LITERATURE REVIEW
1.1 The Adult Support and Protection (Scotland) Bill was introduced in the Scottish Parliament on 30 th March 2006 by Andy Kerr MSP (then Minister for Health and Community Care).
"The policy intention behind the Bill was to close the significant gap in the protection of vulnerable adults in Scotland...policy has been affected by the high profile Borders Inquiry…" (Payne, 2006: 8-12).
1.2 The ASP Act received Royal Assent on 21 st March 2007. An implementation process is in place to support commencement of Part 1 of the Act scheduled for the autumn of 2008.
1.3 The Centre for Ageing and Mental Health at Staffordshire University was commissioned by the Scottish Executive to review the literature relating to the nature, cause, and interventions required to protect "at risk" adults.
1.4 The overarching aim of the review was to produce a critical analysis of the available literature on interventions that work for adults "at risk" who have been subject to harm or abuse. The review included research relating to:
- all adults over the age of sixteen
- all types of service users ( e.g. mental health service users, community care service users, older people, etc.)
- all care environments (including home care settings)
1.5 More specifically, the review was designed to:
- Distinguish between the different types of abuse and harm (searching out international consensus)
- Briefly describe the conditions, characteristics, and circumstances of those who cause harm
- Briefly describe the conditions, characteristics, and circumstances of those who are subject to harm
- Describe the range of interventions and supports ( e.g. mediation, counselling, home care, respite, etc.) available for those who are subject to harm
- Assess the effectiveness of key interventions and supports from the perspective of those who are subject to harm
- Identify the extent to which different interventions are transferable
- Relate interventions specifically to the Scottish context in relation to adult support and protection procedures currently in place in Scotland
1.6 A note on terminology:
- Throughout this paper, the terms "at risk" and " vulnerable" are used interchangeably.
- The terms " abuse", " harm", and " mistreatment" are used interchangeably in the literature.
- The term " continuing care" is used as a proxy for any form of care that is not acute or short term. Continuing care might include residential or nursing care, hospital care, or care provided on a continuing basis as day care or respite care.
1.7 For consistency, and to enable comparisons, most chapters in the review are structured with the same format:
Introduction
Definition
Characteristics
Support and protection
Primary intervention
Secondary intervention
Tertiary intervention
Conclusions
1.8 This review covers case studies, anecdotal reports, primary research, and grey literature; see 2.4 and Appendix 1. Although a thorough analysis of existing work was performed to examine the effectiveness of support and protection interventions, little or no evidence exists in regards to 'evidence based practice'. Therefore this review is limited in relation to reporting 'what works', but describes the support and protection that is available and what is predominantly implemented in cases of adult abuse.
« Previous | Contents | Next »