Being Heard, Exerting Influence, or Knowing How to Play the Game? Expectations of Client Involvement among Social and Health Care Professionals and Clients

Weiste, Elina; Käpykangas, Sari; Uusitalo, Lise-Lotte; Stevanovic, Melisa

doi:10.3390/ijerph17165653

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Being Heard, Exerting Influence, or Knowing How to Play the Game? Expectations of Client Involvement among Social and Health Care Professionals and Clients

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Finnish Institute of Occupational Health, P.O. Box 40, FI-00032 Helsinki, Finland

Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Helsinki, P.O. Box 54, FI-00014 Helsinki, Finland

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Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2020, 17(16), 5653; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph17165653

Received: 29 June 2020 / Revised: 26 July 2020 / Accepted: 1 August 2020 / Published: 5 August 2020

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Healthcare Work and the Role of Clients in Change)

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Abstract

Contemporary social and health care services exhibit a significant movement toward increasing client involvement in their own care and in the development of services. This major cultural change represents a marked shift in the client’s role from a passive patient to an active empowered agent. We draw on interaction-oriented focus group research and conversation analysis to study workshop conversations in which social and health care clients and professionals discussed “client involvement”. Our analysis focuses on the participants’ mutually congruent or discrepant views on the topic. The professionals and clients both saw client involvement as an ideal that should be promoted. Although both participant groups considered the clients’ experience of being heard a prerequisite of client involvement, the clients deviated from the professionals in that they also highlighted the need for actual decision-making power. However, when the professionals invoked the clients’ responsibility for their own treatment, the clients were not eager to agree with their view. In addition, in analyzing problems of client involvement during the clients’ and professionals’ meta-talk about client involvement, the paper also shows how the “client involvement” rhetoric itself may, paradoxically, sometimes serve to hinder here-and-now client involvement. View Full-Text

Keywords: client involvement; client participation; cultural change; co-development; conversation analysis; social and health care professionals; interaction; qualitative research

This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited

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Weiste, E.; Käpykangas, S.; Uusitalo, L.-L.; Stevanovic, M. Being Heard, Exerting Influence, or Knowing How to Play the Game? Expectations of Client Involvement among Social and Health Care Professionals and Clients. Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2020, 17, 5653. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph17165653

AMA Style

Weiste E, Käpykangas S, Uusitalo L-L, Stevanovic M. Being Heard, Exerting Influence, or Knowing How to Play the Game? Expectations of Client Involvement among Social and Health Care Professionals and Clients. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health. 2020; 17(16):5653. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph17165653

Chicago/Turabian Style

Weiste, Elina, Sari Käpykangas, Lise-Lotte Uusitalo, and Melisa Stevanovic. 2020. "Being Heard, Exerting Influence, or Knowing How to Play the Game? Expectations of Client Involvement among Social and Health Care Professionals and Clients" International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health 17, no. 16: 5653. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph17165653

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Being Heard, Exerting Influence, or Knowing How to Play the Game? Expectations of Client Involvement among Social and Health Care Professionals and Clients

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