Social Science - Sociology Assignment

Imagine that you sit down with a client at your agency, and the client says, “Thanks so much for seeing me. I’m good friends with your brother.” Would treating the person be an ethical violation? What do you do next? While this may be a simple conflict of interest, it may not be. Where is the line between acceptable and unacceptable—could you treat a cousin’s friend, for example, or a friend of a friend? 

Social workers may feel pressure to respond in the moment, but often a pause is needed to truly consider the implications. Thankfully, social work practitioners and those in related fields have developed decision-making models to help guide professionals through dilemmas like this, and even more complex ones. 

In this Assignment, you apply Elaine Congress’s ETHIC Model to navigate an ethical scenario.

To prepare:

· Review the Learning Resources on ethics. Download the ETHIC Model of Decision Making document.

· Read the following ethical scenarios and choose one to use for this Assignment:

· Scenario 1:  You are treating a 15-year-old female client for an eating disorder. She reveals that she is pregnant and does not want you to share this information with her parents. What do you tell her? Following the session, the client’s mother, who has been waiting in the lobby, asks how the session went. What do you say?

· Scenario 2:  You are a social worker in a nursing home. Your favorite resident, Mr. Blakely (diagnosed with dementia 6 months ago), has just returned from a doctor’s visit with his son. His son tells you that Mr. Blakely has been diagnosed with terminal cancer. The son does not want you to tell Mr. Blakely or any of the family (he has power of attorney) about this new diagnosis. He says, “Dad won’t remember it anyway.”  Later that day, Mr. Blakely asks you what the doctor said about his visit because his son would not tell him. What do you do? The patient is also given new medications (for cancer pain management) and wants to know what they are for. What do you tell him?

· Consider how you would respond to the scenario using the ETHIC Model. 

ASSIGNMENT BELOW:

Submit a 1-page paper in which you use the ETHIC Model to respond to the chosen practice scenario. 

Imagine that you sit down with a client at your agency, and the client says, “Thanks so much for seeing me. I’m good friends with your brother.” Would treating the person be an ethical violation? What do you do next? While this may be a simple conflict of interest, it may not be. Where is the line between acceptable and unacceptable—could you treat a cousin’s friend, for example, or a friend of a friend? 

Social workers may feel pressure to respond in the moment, but often a pause is needed to truly consider the implications. Thankfully, social work practitioners and those in related fields have developed decision-making models to help guide professionals through dilemmas like this, and even more complex ones. 

In this Assignment, you apply Elaine Congress’s ETHIC Model to navigate an ethical scenario.

To prepare:

· Review the Learning Resources on ethics. Download the ETHIC Model of Decision Making document.

· Read the following ethical scenarios and choose one to use for this Assignment:

· Scenario 1:  You are treating a 15-year-old female client for an eating disorder. She reveals that she is pregnant and does not want you to share this information with her parents. What do you tell her? Following the session, the client’s mother, who has been waiting in the lobby, asks how the session went. What do you say?

· Scenario 2:  You are a social worker in a nursing home. Your favorite resident, Mr. Blakely (diagnosed with dementia 6 months ago), has just returned from a doctor’s visit with his son. His son tells you that Mr. Blakely has been diagnosed with terminal cancer. The son does not want you to tell Mr. Blakely or any of the family (he has power of attorney) about this new diagnosis. He says, “Dad won’t remember it anyway.”  Later that day, Mr. Blakely asks you what the doctor said about his visit because his son would not tell him. What do you do? The patient is also given new medications (for cancer pain management) and wants to know what they are for. What do you tell him?

· Consider how you would respond to the scenario using the ETHIC Model. 

ASSIGNMENT BELOW:

Submit a 1-page paper in which you use the ETHIC Model to respond to the chosen practice scenario.