Drafting a Process Evaluation

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Week7: Developing a Logic Model Outline Handout

Ana Melendez

Master of Social Work, Walden University

SOCW 6311: Social Work Research in Practice II

Dr. Linda Hadeed

January 16, 2022

Week7: Developing a Logic Model Outline Handout

Practice-Level Logic Model

At the practice level, Helen is clearly in distress both physically and mentally. She needs support from her family to relieve her of the burden she is carrying. Being the main caregiver, Helen is stressed a lot which is not healthy for her or the ones she is caring for. According to Lam (2014), caregivers need to be aware of when they are suffering or in distress and seek help for the sake of those who they are caring for. The elderly can achieve better outcomes when they have strong and healthy caregivers. Helen needs a support group where she can learn more about caregiving and proper coping mechanisms. In a support group, a member engages with others who have similar problems and goals, which provides them with social support.

With Magda’s health deteriorating and Helen not being able to find a solution to get her in a stable environment yet, outside resources, such as church members, state programs for older adults need to be considered as possible solutions to help with Magda's situation. The goal of a support group is to get members, such as Helen to have improved health outcomes and share stress management to reduce anxiety (Schulz et al., 2016). The outcomes can be measured by observing the changes in how relaxed Helen will be in opening up about her changes, improvement in both Magda’s and Helen’s health status.

Problem	Needs	Underlying Causes	Intervention Activities	Outcomes
-Stress and anxiety, due to the multiple duties she is performing as a caregiver. -Financial strain as she caters for her family and mother-in-law bills including medical expenses. -Lack of support doing house chores and financial help. -Isolation as she no longer has persona time. -Burnout as she feels overwhelmed by her duties including her job at the hospital.	-Peace of mind, whereby she can have enough time for herself and not feel overwhelmed by her duties. -Find a support group where she can share her experiences with other caregivers. -Need for outside resources to care for Magda. -Making her children understand her struggles and having them help where they can.	-Helen is a caregiver who has a lot of stress as she is managing many things at the same time and has no working solutions on how to make it easier on her. -Magda's condition needs are draining and giving Helen too much stress, which compromises her resilience. -Even with the individual therapy sessions, Helen is still under distress as new problems surface instead of possible solutions.	-Providing Helen with the assistance she needs starts with enrolling her in a support group where she can be enlightened more about being a caregiver. -Reaching out to the recreational centers and community church as outside sources to help care for Magda either in doing house chores, providing meals, keeping her engaged in physical activities, and also consulting state programs meant to help older adults.	-Helen shows signs of relief from having a long-term solution to taking care of Magda. -Having her time and feeling close again to her children, husband, and friends. -Being able to multitask with little or no pressure will help Helen remain healthy both mentally and physically. -Helen should feel that she is in control of her life again and feel that she is not alone in the problems she is facing.

Program-Level Logic Model Outline

At the program level, it is clear that Helen needs psychotherapy and should join a support group for caregivers. A support group for caregivers is composed of members who are caregivers, are willing to share their experiences, and are ready to earn ways of bettering themselves as caregivers (Lam, 2014). The group should be able to deal with caregivers who have a variety of issues relating to their caregiving roles. Some of the activities to be involved in a caregiver support group include relaxation activities like taking freely to a therapist, sharing with the group members, creating a stress-free learning environment, and writing as a form of expressing emotions.

The short-term outcomes include improvement in the well-being of the individuals involved and changes in stress coping mechanisms. The long-term outcomes include better health maintenance for Magda, Helen, and Alec, the proper state of mind for all caregivers, the establishment of a stable healing environment for Magda, and Helen. In addition, there should be increased self-awareness for caregivers to protect their peace. For long-term outcomes to be achieved it is important to have a multidisciplinary team to help care for the clients (Randolph, 2010). These outcomes will be measured by members’ active participation in groups, the interventions that work best for each member, identifying new problems and how the clients are handling them, and stress coping mechanisms.

Problem	Needs	Underlying Causes	Intervention Activities	Outcomes
Anxiety, stress, and generational problems.	-Ensuring that Helen regains her health, ensuring that Alec is in the right state of mind if he is to care for Magda. -Ensuring that Magda has a stable dewing environment that does not involve overwhelming Helen.	-Lack of proper professional resources since Helen cannot afford to pay a professional every day. -Lack of openness in discussing the problem. Inadequate knowledge on caregiving as shown by Alec. -Lack of proper methods to address the complex needs for both Helen and Magda.	-Incorporating a multidisciplinary team as an element of the program to help caregivers out. -Proper evaluation of client's needs and best ways to address them. -Engaging the individuals in therapeutic activities which are meant to help them develop coping mechanisms to different stressors and how to be resilient.	-Improvement in state of mind and health for the affected individuals. -Stable environments for which is comfortable for the healing process. -Proper adjustment to stress and stressors.

References

Lam, L.C.H. (2014). Practice evaluation report: a social support group for caregivers of dementia elderly. The City University of Hong Kong.

Randolph, K. A. (2010). Logic models. The Handbook of Social Work Methods, 547-561. Sage Publications. https://dx.doi.org/10.4135/9781544364902.n31

Schulz, R., Eden, J., & National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. (2016). Family caregiving roles and impacts. In Families Caring for an Aging America. National Academies Press (US). https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK396398/

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