Health Care Assistants Conference London Taking it in your stride maintaining your own self care Mat

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Health Care Assistants Conference
LondonTaking it in your stride - maintaining
your own self careMatthew Rice
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Session outcomes

• Understand the concept of self care and why it is
  important
• Explore the concept of support
• Identify the physical, emotional and behavioural
  consequences of stress and the different ways of
  managing it.
• Introduce the concept of reflective practice

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What does self care mean?

• ..the care taken by individuals towards their
  health and well being, and includes the care
  extended to their children, family, friends and
  others in neighbourhoods and local
  communities.. (DoH, 2005)

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Self care includes

• Staying fit and maintaining good physical and
  mental health
• Meeting psychological and social needs
• Preventing illness and accidents
• Caring for minor ailments and long term
  conditions.

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Self care and the HCA role

• So what are the challenges?

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Support - why is it important?

• To ensure you work within your level of
  competence
• To ensure accountability to the needs of your
  employer
• To promote learning and development
• To help you manage the emotional demands of a
  range of potentially very complex situations
• To ensure safe, ethical and professional practice

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The four levels of support (Stoltenberg
Delworth, 1987)

• Level 1 - characterised by a level of dependency.
  At this stage the learner is fairly novice and
  can feel anxious and insecure in their role. The
  learner is very dependent upon support which
  needs to be clearly structured.
• Level 2 - characterised by a fluctuation between
  dependency and autonomy. Mistakes are learnt
  from by reflecting, analysing and evaluating.
  Support at this stage needs to be less didactic
  to enable problem solving. Feeling deskilled is
  quite usual at this stage.

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• Level 3 - an increase in self confidence, with
  conditional dependency on the supporter.
  Approaches are adapted and responsive to the
  particular context. There is less emphasis on
  learning about the new skill or competence.
• Level 4 - characterised by personal autonomy,
  insightful awareness, personal security and an
  ability to confront personal and professional
  problems. May provide support for more novice
  learners. This stage is about deepening and
  integrating existing knowledge.

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Think of a skill you are developing

• What is the level of support you require?
• Where do you get this support from?
• How effective is the support?
• What would make it even more effective?

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Stress and you

• Take a moment to think about how you react in
  stressful situations
• What physical reactions do you notice?
• What emotional reactions do you experience?
• What behavioural changes do you notice?

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What do you do to take care of you stress?

• 1.
• 2.
• 3.

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Ways of coping with stress

• Palliative - helpful in getting us through
  difficult times but can also lead to other
  problems. Examples include smoking, eating,
  spending money etc.
• Indirect - These methods use up the adrenaline
  released but they do not directly tackle the
  problem so the symptoms return. Examples include
  exercise, yoga, massage, sport, taking a hot bath
  etc.
• Direct - These ways involve acknowledging the
  problem and directly working on it. Examples
  include problem solving, talking to others,
  assertiveness training, reflective practice.

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Top tips for taking care of stress

• Understand your stress, remember some stress is
  positive and can make you perform better.
• Develop a healthier lifestyle and healthier diet.
• Express how you feel.
• Think proactively about the work situations you
  find yourself in.
• Try out assertiveness techniques - saying No!
• Identify the triggers at work, speak to your line
  manager and other trusted colleagues - and get
  the balance right between work and play!

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Reflective Practice (Schon, 1983)

• Reflection-in-action - dealing with situations
  as they occur in the moment. Decision making is
  immediate and based on previous experience.
• Reflection-on-action - takes place after the
  event where you can look back in hindsight and
  review the situation. The most common type of
  reflection.

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Why is reflective practice important?

• It develops critical thinking
• It increases self confidence and self awareness
• It can help link theory to your practice
• It helps us to learn from doing
• It increases our ability to problem solve
• It enhances personal and professional development
• It is about taking things in your stride and
  maintaining self care.

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Gibbs Model of Reflection (1988)
Description What happened?
Action Planning What will you you do differently
next time?
Feelings What were you thinking and feeling?
Evaluation What was ve / -ve about the situation?
Analysis What sense do you make of the situation
now?
Conclusion What have you learned?
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Acknowledgements

• Thanks to Kath Sharman, Ayesha Dost, Anna
  Lynall and everyone else involved in the
  development of resources for the WiPP Self Care
  for People Project, all of which have informed
  the content of this workshop.
• For more information about the Self Care for
  You Programme please visit the WiPP website