social work practice research collaboration

International Community for Practice Research in Social Work

Welcome to the icprsw  research collaboration innovation social change - .

The origins of practice research in social work can be traced back to the Transforming Social Work Practice, Education and Inquiry conference in Finland in 2007. It started as a small gathering of participants aiming to improve the connection between practice and research. The first international conference on practice research in Salisbury in 2008 laid the foundation for future conferences and statements. Each subsequent conference, including Helsinki, New York, and Hong Kong, Melbourne and the most recent conference in Aalborg have contributed to the evolving definition of practice research, emphasizing the involvement of practitioners, service users, researchers, and other stakeholders. The conferences explored the complexity of social work practice and sought to bridge the gap between research and practice through collaboration, dialogue, and inclusive inquiry.

Our Practice Research Collaboratives keep our community connected between our triennial conferences - you can learn more about them here . 

A brief history of the ICPRSW community can be found here . 

Enjoy exploring our website. 

Our beginnings ...

The first conference was held in 2008 in Salisbury UK in 2008 and this picture shows the inaugural attendees who drafted the first Statement on Practice Research : 

Gurid Aga Askeland, Norway 

Mike Austin, USA 

Tony Evans, UK 

Sylvia Fargion, Italy 

Mike Fisher, UK 

Jan Fook, UK 

Ilse Julkunen, Finland 

Aulikki Kananoja, Finland 

Synnove Karvinen-Niinikoski, Finland 

Rhoda MacRae, UK 

Edgar Marthinsen, Norway 

Matts Mosesson, Sweden 

Joan Orme, UK 

Helen Pain, UK 

Jackie Powell, UK 

Gillian Ruch, UK 

Mirja Satka, Finland 

Riki Savaya, Israel 

Ian Shaw, UK 

Tim Sim, Hong Kong 

Lars Uggerhoj, Denmark 

Helen Welsh, UK 

Bessa Whitmore, Canada 

Laura Yliruka, Finland 

The International Community for Practice Research in Social Work (ICPR) provides a platform for collaboration among researchers, practitioners, service users and policy makers around the globe.

Our community engages in the sharing of research findings, methodologies and practices, as well as promoting cross-cultural learning and  discussions between international colleagues and agencies. The ICPR meets every three years for our international conference and on an annual basis through our five Practice Research Collaboratives.

We believe powerful social change, requires quality, practice-driven research.

Practice Research Collaboratives

Research, Impact, Translation &  Influence

This group focusses on making impact on practice and policy, along with forming alliances.

Systemic Lens to Social Work Practice

This collaborative's main interest is to expand knowledge relating to systemic child welfare.

Organisational Supports

This group focusses on approaches to acquiring organisational support for research in both practice and university settings.

Setting Outcomes

This collaborative has a particular emphasis on methods for evaluating efficacy and impact of social work interventions.

Collaboration & Co-Creation with Service Users

This group focusses on the collaboration and co-creation of practice research, with clients and service users.

Diversity in Family Work

This collaborative focuses on issues related to race, sexuality, religion and spirituality, class, abilities that impact the processes and outcomes of working with families.

Every three years, our members from across the world come together for our international conference on practice research. Our next conference will be in 2026 - TBA

Recent news.

The program for the Aalborg Conference can be viewed by clicking on the image below. 

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Research Collaboratives

If you wish to speak to a specific Practice Research Collaborative, please see the individual collaborative's page using the menu at the top.

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Article Contents

Introduction, what is practice research and why (and for whom) does it matter, practice research as an organisationally rooted participatory research methodology, practice research frameworks, how can service users benefit from participating in practice research, integrating practice research processes into social service organisational analysis, applications of practice research for social service organisations, methodological and ethical considerations for practice research-based organisational analysis, implications and an agenda for social work researchers, acknowledgements.

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Practice research methods in social work: Processes, applications and implications for social service organisations

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Bowen McBeath, Michael J Austin, Sarah Carnochan, Emmeline Chuang, Practice research methods in social work: Processes, applications and implications for social service organisations, The British Journal of Social Work , Volume 52, Issue 6, September 2022, Pages 3328–3346, https://doi.org/10.1093/bjsw/bcab246

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Although social work research is commonly rooted within social service settings, it can be difficult for social work researchers and practitioners to develop and sustain participatory studies that specifically promote knowledge sharing and service improvement involving organisational practice. One participatory approach is practice research (PR), which involves social work researchers and practitioners collaborating to define, understand and try to improve the delivery of health and social care services and organisational structures and processes. The two goals of this commentary are to introduce essential methods and approaches to PR and to identify points of connection involving PR and social service organisational studies. Our specific focus on PR in statutory, voluntary and private social service organisations reflects efforts to connect practice, theory and qualitative and quantitative research methods to develop and share organisationally-situated knowledge.

This paper offers an overview of practice research (PR) that focuses on the delivery of social work services in social service organisations. PR is a participatory method used by researchers to address the needs of vulnerable populations, notably poor communities of colour, who receive health and social care services in formal organisational settings. PR is ‘a knowledge development process that focuses primarily on the roles of the service provider, service user, and the service researcher who all participate in defining the research questions and interpreting the findings’ ( Fisher et al. , 2016 ). PR therefore seeks to improve social work and other social services and promote the well-being of service users; and functions as a collaborative process that minimises power differentials between participants ( Austin, 2020 ).

The macro-organisational context of PR studies includes concerns of managerialism amidst neoliberalism, involving increased professionalisation, the use of evidence-based practices and the structuring of service programmes around carefully defined performance measures in response to administrative and policy requirements ( Hasenfeld and Garrow, 2012 ; Harlow et al. , 2013 ; Yan et al. , 2017 ). The meso-organisational context of PR studies involves the development and sustainment of organisational spaces for reflection and sharing that support practitioner engagement in evidence-informed practice ( Carnochan et al. , 2017 ; Brandt et al. , 2020 ). The immediate context for PR is the bureaucratic encounters that involve staff and service users as well as practitioner use of research to promote organisational learning ( Austin and Carnochan, 2020 ). With its specific focus on statutory, voluntary and private social service organisations, PR aims to strengthen the collaborative capacity of practitioners and researchers to support service improvement and responsiveness to the perspectives of service users (capturing the expertise of experience).

In order to describe PR within organisations providing health and social care services, our paper is divided into four sections. First, we provide a brief introduction to PR to characterise its core elements. We also provide a brief review of the major approaches to PR, distinguishing between PR frameworks at different levels of practice and in different geographic contexts. We then identify how service users can benefit from PR. Secondly, we identify how PR processes can be integrated within social service organisational analysis, focusing in particular on how practice researchers and their agency partners (notably front line staff and managers) collaboratively seek to improve social service delivery, support organisational learning and promote interorganisational knowledge sharing. We also summarise PR processes that are based on the core concepts embedded in the science of the concrete (SOC) ( Flyvbjerg, 2001 ). Thirdly, we illustrate the applications of PR for local authorities/counties and voluntary social service organisations with the use of three brief examples featuring methodological and ethical considerations for researchers using PR approaches. Finally, we conclude by identifying implications for social work organisational researchers participating in PR studies and proposing a future research agenda.

At its core, PR is a negotiated process involving multiple stakeholders ( Uggerhøj, 2011 ). These stakeholders include statutory, voluntary and private social service organisations; managers, staff and service users within the organisation; researchers; and policymakers and community leaders. They all function within the context of intergroup communications, negotiation and shared learning needed to address the gap between research and practice and support learning across role-based social, cultural and organisational distances ( Austin and Carnochan, 2020 ).

In order to address this gap, PR involves elements of both practice and research. The elements of practice include: (1) engaging and including diverse types of stakeholders; (2) an effort to rebalance power relationships across organisational contexts, by validating the experiences and expertise of participants at different levels of the organisation; (3) open and frequent conversations to promote dialogue and sustain norms of trust and reciprocity; and (4) an appreciation for the critical role of organisational supports (notably managers) for exploring service innovation ( Uggerhøj, 2011 ).

Essential research elements of PR include the use of quantitative and qualitative data, as well as the reliance on evidence collected within the agency setting. The use of different types of evidence can generate two major research tensions; namely, balancing the breadth (as seen in large organisational surveys and administrative service databases) and depth (e.g. analysis of client case records, in-depth interviews) of research while navigating the tension between research rigour and practice wisdom displayed by practitioners and service users ( Julkunen, 2011 ).

These practice and research elements are integrated into PR studies that evolve in response to ongoing and changing agency needs and priorities. Facilitated group dialogue is used to collaboratively identify practice concerns, conduct research in response to the concerns, and share findings with a focus on assessing current social work practices and identifying opportunities for improvement ( Austin, 2020 ). PR involves power sharing and role shifting through reciprocal learning, as traditionally less-engaged stakeholders explore new roles (e.g. from service user to PR partner); and as managers and researchers reframe their traditional roles (e.g. exploring the emergence of practice-informed management research and research-informed management practice) ( Fisher et al. , 2016 ).

As one of several participatory social science research methods, PR reflects the emphasis of researchers on practice-in-context. In particular, PR shares a number of characteristics with participatory action research (PAR) and empowerment evaluation. In each method, collaboration with service users and other stakeholder groups is central to identifying basic research questions that relate to practices, programmes and/or policies as expressions of larger institutional forces. Furthermore, these approaches draw on diverse sources of literature, including practice and policy reports as well as academic research studies, to inform research questions. Lastly, collaborative collection and analysis of qualitative and/or quantitative data is carried out by research and practice partners across the three research traditions ( Healy, 2001 ; Fetterman et al. , 2017 ).

However, while PR shares many similarities with PAR and programme evaluation principles, it also differs in several important ways related to goals, data sources, data interpretation and the nature of knowledge development and dissemination (see Table 1 ). For example, a main goal of programme evaluation includes the central role of specifying programme objectives to inform funder or organisational decision making in a narrowly defined area (e.g. continue, modify or eliminate a programme). In contrast, PR goals may be much broader, and intended to inform participants’ conceptual thinking about current practice or service delivery and create dialogical opportunities without the same emphasis on direct implications for organisational decision making. Differences also appear in the area of research dissemination. Specifically, programme evaluation results are often used to support organisational planning in response to formal funding and policy requirements, and PAR is often used to support socio-political action or community change. In comparison, PR focuses more on service and practice improvement as well as the relationship between theory and practice, with the goal of encouraging more research-minded practitioners and more practice-minded researchers ( Saurama and Julkunen, 2012 ).

Comparing PR with other research frameworks a

Adapted from Austin and Carnochan (2020 , p. 199).

Another critical factor that distinguishes PR from other participatory research methods is the connection between social work practice and social service managers. Compared to action research and empowerment evaluation methodologies, PR is more explicitly organisational in understanding how managers, front line staff and service users make sense of their diverse roles and often competing statuses. PR is also more attentive to the collaborative interrelationships of service users, front line agency staff and managers in their interorganisational and institutional context. Finally, PR demonstrates an awareness of how questions of service delivery reflect the professionalisation of social work and social services vis-à-vis questions of organisational learning ( Fisher et al. , 2016 ).

Finally, another key difference between PR and its related methodologies can be found in the relationship of organisationally situated theories vis-à-vis practice. For practice researchers, considerations of theory-informed practice and practice-informed theory are important ( Fisher, 2011 ). The exploration and development of diverse theories (e.g. cultural–historical activity theory; Foot, 2014 ) helps practice researchers and participants identify shared practice challenges and explore possible solutions. For example, practice researchers can share lessons learned and practice implications of different theories of group-based learning and relational work, so that managers, workers and service users can determine how each theory enhances shared understanding of service problems and possible solutions ( Austin, 2020 ; Muurinen and Kaarianen, 2021 ).

In sum, PR is explicitly rooted within social service organisations, with a basic goal of collaborating to improve the delivery of health and social care services and organisational capacity within and between organisations ( Austin and Carnochan, 2020 ). Practice researchers pay close attention to the delivery of front line services as well as multilevel practice issues relating to managers, staff and service users.

The evolution of PR has reflected theoretical and practical developments. Practice researchers have used person-in-organisation theories of practice in an effort to explain the ‘everyday actions’ ( Feldman and Orlikowski, 2011 , p. 1241) and ‘concrete activities’ ( Barley and Kunda, 2001 , p. 76) that capture the relationship between agency-based service providers and service users. Researchers have also proposed ways of enhancing the practical relevance of research that involves social work researchers and practitioners promoting shared learning, with a goal of resolving fundamental service delivery dilemmas ( Austin et al. , 2014 ).

In response to these developments, the interrelated streams of PR have been explored in the form of collaboration and negotiation. For example, the foundational perspective of PR invites practitioners and service users to collaboratively identify opportunities to improve social work practices and organisational processes—particularly in response to administrative requirements and statutory mandates ( Fook and Gardner, 2007 ; Epstein, 2009 ). Similarly, there are opportunities to negotiate across differing approaches and perspectives that practitioners, service users and researchers bring to the knowledge production process ( Uggerhøj, 2011 ).

Based on the original formulation of PR, Julkunen (2011) developed a typology of PR studies, distinguishing between practitioner-oriented, generative, method-oriented and democratic models. In the practitioner-oriented model, the practitioner reflectively dialogues with others in order to address pressing practice issues. The generative model involves cycles of agency practice and research designed to connect practical knowledge to action by testing and evaluating potential practice innovations. The method-oriented model involves the service user, practitioner and researcher collaboratively developing practice-based knowledge as well as knowledge that can inform theory development and application. Finally, the democratic model focuses specifically on service users, practitioners, researchers and organisational and system leaders using PR to advocate for practice reforms, thereby connecting PR to policy change (also see Fisher, 2013 ).

Although scholarship on PR has historically reflected the perspectives of Nordic and US academic institutions and social welfare states, a globally diverse body of PR literature is emerging ( Chan and Sim, 2020 ). This literature demonstrates that different PR studies may reflect different: political, policy and organisational contexts of social service delivery; research methods; understandings of service user and practitioner involvement and collaboration and understandings of practice ( Sim et al. , 2018 ).

Empirical research on benefits accrued by service users when engaging in PR is currently limited. However, preliminary evidence suggests that benefits can be organised in terms of empowerment processes and measurable outcomes built on the service user premise of ‘nothing about us, without us’ ( Beresford and McLaughlin, 2020 ). Such processes invite PR participants to learn how to participate in non-hierarchical relationships that ensure diversity, equity and inclusion among service users and providers. This partnership relationship often involves joint problem-solving as well as developing a critical consciousness leading to an alliance through the articulation of shared and different needs and challenges ( Fook and Gardner, 2007 ). Engaging in this process can help service users gain a greater understanding of the contextualised nature of social problems they face.

Another key benefit of participating in PR involves expanding the capacities of service users to amplify their own voices and assume the position of representing the perspectives of peer-colleagues ( Austin and Carnochan, 2020 ). Service users may advocate internally (in response to management directives) and externally (in response to policy dicta and fiscal requirements). As they engage in advocacy efforts, service users can also increase their skills in identifying and accessing community resources (e.g. job training programmes that enhance employability). The process of engaging in humanising power-sharing relationships using dialogical communications between service users, staff and managers can thus involve a shared search for community resources and organisational funding needed to maintain service delivery at needed levels ( Ramon et al. , 2019 ).

The benefits of service user involvement do not necessarily lead to major organisational changes when the focus is on modifying or improving direct service or managerial practice. However, service user involvement can lead to both changes in practice as well as changes in organisational policies and structures ( Julkunen, 2011 ; Fisher, 2013 ). Through involvement in PR, service users can also participate in training and other learning-oriented events as co-equals with staff and other community stakeholders. These opportunities can involve service users playing critical roles of knowledge navigation and translation within social service organisational contexts, particularly where service user perspectives are needed to translate deep knowledge of programme and policy gaps to staff, managers and policymakers ( Muurinen and Kaarianen, 2021 ). Such PR efforts can help spur organisational change and the development of new approaches to system transformation. For service users, skills acquired through participation in PR can also be leveraged in future advocacy efforts or employment opportunities (e.g. serving as a consultant or staff member based on their expertise of experience with a particular social issue) ( Voronka and Grant, 2021 ).

In summary, some of the major benefits derived from service user involvement have been documented ( Natland and Celik, 2015 ) by noting the transition of service user from functioning with a sense of shame or trauma to one of pride and empowerment, in addition to learning how services can be evaluated and improved based on timely and strategic input from service users. A major limitation related to service user involvement could be that their involvement in which their service user experiences are contextualised or revisited could result in being retraumatised (e.g. reliving the experiences of being homeless, incarcerated, unemployed, physically disabled or mentally disabled), especially when acquiring the ‘big picture understanding’ of the pervasiveness of social problems in the larger society ( Müller and Pihl-Thingvad, 2020 ).

The next section identifies common approaches for practice researchers to collaborate with agency-based practitioners and managers in support of service user preferences.

PR processes reflect the evolving interests of social service organisational researchers and practitioners, as seen in their concerns with the formal delivery of contract-based public services, with specific focus on service access and equity considerations ( Jindra et al. , 2020 ). In a similar way, PR processes capture the concerns of managerialism as a response to neoliberalism and austerity, especially in European, Australian and Asian social welfare contexts ( Yan et al. , 2017 ; Alexander and Fernandez, 2021 ). Underlying these interests is an abiding focus on studies that validate and feature the perspectives of service users and service providers ( Hasenfeld and Garrow, 2012 ; Harlow et al. , 2013 ). These studies reflect decades of organisational research, as seen in Table 2 (for a review, see Austin and Carnochan, 2020 ). The overarching effort is to democratise knowledge sharing within social service organisational settings by identifying complementary ways for service users, practitioners, researchers and advocates to contribute to social service delivery.

Complementary types of practice research with social service organisations

For social service organisational scholars, PR processes support exploratory, explanatory and interventive research aims. In exploratory research, PR is used to identify the diverse organisational experiences of service users and service providers ( Austin, 2020 ). These exploratory studies are analogous to participatory needs assessments. In contrast, explanatory PR examines connections between service, programme or policy logics, and identifies broken or missing logics reflecting needed resources (notably, time, funding and training). For example, the identification of gaps between needs and services often reflects historically and/or currently unaddressed service needs (as seen by service users), programme needs (as perceived by front line staff) and organisational learning and policy implementation needs (as viewed by agency leaders) ( Hasenfeld and Garrow, 2012 ; Spitzmueller, 2018 ). Finally, PR can support intervention studies that involve the co-design, co-development, refinement and sharing of new practices within programmes (e.g. practical innovations that benefit service users and front line workers) ( Schalock et al. , 2014 ).

PR-based social service studies can be viewed from the perspectives of the SOC ( Flyvbjerg, 2001 ) that invites researchers to propose person-oriented research questions related to those individuals and groups most impacted by the issues at hand. The SOC also asks researchers to focus on small practices that support big events or processes by exploring everyday activities and their contexts that connect people and their organisational milieu. Finally, the SOC involves engaging multiple stakeholders while reducing power differentials. In PR, managers are viewed as essential linchpins who facilitate shared learning, by validating the multiple organisational identities of participants.

Although social service organisational research based on the SOC can take many forms, it ordinarily begins with question formulation around one or more practical problems or concerns. As elucidated by Austin and Carnochan (2020) , PR questions can take a variety of forms but generally involve three fundamental questions: How can we improve social services and, more broadly, enhance opportunities for health and social care? How can we amplify the voices of service users? and How can we sustain small innovations and promising practices in social work, particularly in different organisational and policy settings? Jointly defining PR questions involves validating the perspectives of each type of participant. Questions derived from the perspectives of service users and staff require considerable outreach in order to engage and amplify service user and practitioner voices (e.g. via service user- and staff-led meetings) ( Uggerhøj, 2011 ).

In comparison, organisational and policy-focused research questions are often formulated by senior management in regards to intra-organisational issues (e.g. cross-departmental coordination and collaboration) and inter-organisational issues (e.g. contracting and implementation challenges involving statutory, voluntary and private social service organisations) ( Fisher, 2013 ). Negotiating among the diverse types of research questions involves explaining why the questions are relevant for different groups, how each envisioned research study can support mutually beneficial goals, and what benefits and challenges might arise as a result.

Other key concepts of the SOC that support PR studies include collaboration and engagement with partners based on persistent communication, representation of diverse memberships, fostering inclusiveness, engaging in difficult conversations and consensus building. Other needed skills involve managing critical tensions, often relating to the responsibilities and expectations of different PR stakeholders. Additional tensions reflect the evolving demands of the organisation vis-à-vis its institutional environment. These tensions need to be addressed through shared dialogue in PR teams ( Julkunen, 2011 ).

As the PR team coalesces, it informs research design, data collection, data interpretation and research dissemination and utilisation in unique ways ( Austin, 2020 ). For example, the more traditional use of literature reviews is to ensure that the research questions and study design are informed by the latest peer-reviewed research studies, by reflecting their findings, key concepts, research methods and implications for future research. In comparison, building on existing knowledge in PR may also involve review of organisational documents, grey literature and the practice wisdom of practitioners and service users ( Austin and Carnochan, 2020 ).

In PR, literature reviews can also become ends in themselves. For example, PR-informed literature reviews can assist in reframing service processes (i.e. identifying how service users and practitioners understand the theories of action underlying service logic models); help staff to become more evidence-informed by reflecting on diverse practice literature and inform managerial decision-making processes. Similarly, in contrast to the traditional scholarly approach of disseminating research findings via peer-reviewed publications in academic journals, practice researchers also share findings directly with service providers and service users in the form of reports and presentations so that practice partners can identify novel applications and more effective approaches to practice.

This section provides three brief examples of PR-based organisational studies. The institutional context of the examples reflects a longstanding PR centre located in a US public research university, a regional consortium of county organisations that administer statutorily required social services and a regional consortium of non-profit organisations that provide voluntary social services. Regionalisation of PR efforts is not uncommon, particularly when organised through academic–practice partnerships involving research, education and training and service functions (often in metropolitan areas).

PR centres serve as network hubs for developing service, workforce and programme studies in response to institutional and local demands (e.g. new policy implementation requirements impacting service delivery). They share PR-based knowledge in order to advocate with local and regional policy and practice bodies, and work to promote mutual support and shared leadership among social service organisations. From the social service organisational perspective, consortium membership and affiliation with the PR centre can advance knowledge development and utilisation that might not otherwise be possible due to considerations of cost, research capacity or timing ( Schalock et al. , 2014 ). Whilst some PR centres are university-based ( Austin et al. , 1999 ), others are located in public settings (e.g. ministries of health and social services) ( Muurinen and Kaarianen, 2021 ). However, the general purpose of PR centres is similar to centres providing applied evaluation and technical assistance.

For over twenty-five years, the PR centre from which the following examples are drawn has supported collaborative, usable knowledge related to the management and improvement of social work services across the public and non-profit social service sectors ( Austin, 2018 ). Its studies have involved research at the front line, organisational and inter-organisational levels, ranging from qualitative agency-based case studies to large quantitative surveys that span public and non-profit organisations across the region. The studies have supported the collection and sharing of three types of research evidence as noted by Nutley et al. (2007) . The first type relates to conceptual evidence that is often drawn from exploratory PR studies that are designed to support future applications. The second type includes persuasive research evidence that often involves explanatory PR, and is used to advocate (within organisations) and externally (notably, with policymakers, funders and civic leaders). And the third type involves instrumental evidence that often relates to explanatory or interventive PR that is designed to support practice improvements (notably in response to identified service and training needs).

To illustrate some of these PR-informed studies of service delivery, we note the purpose of each study, and then summarise its use by study partners and the consortia of local authorities/counties and non-profit social service organisations. As each study evolved, practice researchers attended to the perspectives of organisational partners through persistent communications, relational work centred in interpersonal and small group meetings, managing tensions in response to ongoing and new challenges and celebrating successes.

The first example involved an exploration of the attributes and sustainability of pioneering non-profit social service organisations through in-depth case histories ( Austin, 2013 ) and focused on the organisational developmental needs of long-serving nonprofits. The study partners and regional consortium of non-profit social service organisations expressed significant interest in findings, leading to requests for self-assessment-based organisational and management support tools designed to promote front line service improvement.

The second example was a survey-based study of how front line and management practitioners across eleven county-based public social service organisations engaged in evidence-informed practice. The quantitative aspect of the study noted the importance of organisational roles and resources, and individual practitioner attitudes towards practice and innovation, in supporting different levels of evidence use ( McBeath et al. , 2015 ). The qualitative component of the study identified the specific cognitive, interactive, action and compliance dimensions of evidence-informed practice that are embedded within agency-based social and organisational practices and priorities ( Carnochan et al. , 2017 ). This explanatory study resulted in the provision of recommendations to the eleven county social service organisations, focused on identifying needed resources and opportunities for peer sharing and social support.

The third example involved a mixed methods study examining the collaborative nature of non-profit contracting amidst technical challenges that reflect the underlying complexity of social service delivery. Qualitative, comparative case study analysis was used to explore the multiple dimensions of relational contracting between non-profit and county social service organisations in three counties ( McBeath et al. , 2017 ). The quantitative component of the study entailed surveying non-profit and county social service organisations across different counties to assess the importance of cross-sector communications, trust-building and shared client accountability for collaborative contracting and social service outcome achievement ( Carnochan et al. , 2019 ; Chuang et al. , 2020 ). Study findings identified the need for public-non-profit social service contracting support structures and processes, including: regularly scheduled cross-sector meetings to identify emergent needs and promising service approaches; and cross-sector training and technical assistance to promote collaborative contracting and improved service outcomes.

Each example involved engagement with agency directors, division heads, senior managers and line staff. In each study, the research design and reporting process was iterative between levels, in support of facilitating communication on broadly relevant topics involving diverse staff groups. Overall, these and other studies from the specific PR centre have regularly featured critical information exchange sessions, involving agency staff presentations of local practices as well as research staff presentations of research syntheses, and in which the audience is cross-division and multi-level.

PR methods complement social service organisational research methodologies in at least two ways. First, PR offers an alternative to traditional organisational research that relies on quantitative analysis of elite surveys (notably agency directors). In comparison, PR studies incorporate diverse types of data (e.g. use of agency documents, interviews, focus groups, surveys) and the perspectives of individuals at different levels of analysis (including administrators and managers, front line staff and service users). These qualitative and quantitative data collection methods are intended to address common source bias and validity concerns. Mixed methods PR studies therefore need to anticipate concerns about the perceived trustworthiness, credibility, confirmability and dependability of the data (e.g. by pilot testing survey instruments and interview guides). (For a summative review concerning how to promote the rigour and relevance of PR studies, see Austin and Carnochan (2020 , pp. 183–189)).

Secondly, PR provides a balanced response to the understanding of researchers as either directing and managing the research process, or serving in subsidiary roles. In comparison, PR is a participatory process in which the research interests and perspectives of the researchers and practitioners are actively negotiated, and often reflect multiple objectives ( Fisher et al. , 2016 ). As noted previously, these include instrumental objectives (e.g. to use PR to enhance understanding of services and programmes, and/or to support organisational learning) along with process and interactional objectives (e.g. to support PR-based participation and collaboration). Among the most challenging aspects embedded in negotiations are values-based objectives that are designed to enhance equity and empowerment through PR projects.

Practice researchers therefore need to be prepared to take on co-facilitative roles on issues ranging from research question formulation to the interpretation, use and wider sharing of PR findings in organisations and broader contexts. These co-roles are essential for addressing group dynamics and cross-sector challenges, celebrating shared wins and fostering inclusiveness and active dialogue. Working through these critical tensions depends on power sharing—particularly for practice researchers and senior agency staff vis-à-vis front line staff and service users—and reflects key elements of intergroup dialogue amidst difference ( Austin, 2020 ).

Whilst there is a wide range of ethical issues associated with PR that draws heavily from social science research, some of the more prominent issues include service user and case record confidentiality, final report contributor equity, teamwork accountability derived from participatory decision making in search of consensus and adherence to data source protocols. The theme of confidentiality is wide ranging. It includes respecting the confidential nature of service user information collected as part of a PR project. It also involves the confidential discussions among research team members, who can include service users and staff. A final concern relates to the ethics of the timely reporting of the research to service users, other agency stakeholders and the larger community (e.g. elected officials, other organisations and researchers). In essence, PR involves the various ethical views of three different communities; namely, the research community, the service provider community and the service user community. The convergence of these three perspectives can be challenging for the various participants to both understand and accept.

These methodological and ethical considerations lead to four suggestions for social service organisational researchers when co-facilitating PR studies to enhance their ability to anticipate common PR challenges. First, PR presents communication-based coordination challenges (involving questions of trust, ethical dilemmas and available expertise), as practice and research partners may need to dialogue regularly amidst already-demanding work schedules. Secondly, partners may face changing and/or limited capacity for and engagement with PR, particularly as practice and research roles and priorities evolve. Thirdly, navigating PR projects requires attending to differing perspectives on the time frame to generate research results, viewed as fast by university standards and slow by agency standards. Fourthly, practice researchers need to demonstrate the capacity to convert research implications into practical recommendations for organisational change given the limited experience with the unique aspects of organisational cultures that differ across participating agencies and research institutions. Underscoring these suggestions is the importance of practice researchers and agency partners remaining flexible with respect to different role-based expectations and university versus agency-based priorities.

We conclude with two major recommendations for social work researchers and practitioners in the social service organisational milieu. First, developing, maintaining and supporting collaborative, trust-based relationships is essential for PR studies. Relationship-building involves recognising mutually beneficial capabilities and shared objectives across different organisational roles (e.g. service users, staff and managers within the agency, and practice-informed researchers inside and outside the agency) to advance collaborative planning. Supporting relationships can involve power-sharing to promote mutual respect and trust as well as social support, particularly amidst the complex dynamics of PR teams. Sustaining relationships calls for transparent information-sharing, consistent communication to address evolving practice and research dilemmas and reciprocal risk-taking that respects the negotiated boundaries of various partners. Finally, sustained relationships often require continuous boundary spanning within the organisation and between agency and university partners.

For productive PR relationships to evolve, an ongoing assessment of practice and research relationships includes monitoring evolving organisational and community contexts, revisiting shared goals in light of changes, and managing PR project expectations in response to evolving stakeholder needs and ethical challenges. Relational work is perhaps the most essential dimension of collaborative, participatory research with social service organisational partners.

Secondly, for practice researchers and agency-based practitioners, the balancing of diverse relational commitments requires sustained self-reflection . Self-reflection involves considering the tensions between the breadth and depth possible in empirical research as well as between the commitment to peer-reviewed empirical research and the investment in practice-based research (e.g. grey literature, agency statistics, practice wisdom). Self-reflection also relates to addressing the different expectations and emphases of service users, staff, managers and other agency stakeholders as well as the different collaborative roles that researchers are required to play when they are invited to step up as co-leaders or step back (e.g. comfortably serving as a research consultant), depending on the specific needs of the research team in its organisational context. These reflexive considerations are centred in an ethos of collaboratively improving service delivery to enhance service user well-being.

While reflecting on identified tensions is a critical aspect of the efforts of practice researchers in relationship with agency-based partners, it is also essential for researchers located in university-based settings. Self-reflection on these tensions can involve deeper questions of how to: (1) reconcile the often-competing expectations of one’s academic home, one’s social service organisational partners and one’s role as a scholar–researcher and (2) reframe these competing expectations into complementary aims. Regular dialogue involving practice and research partners concerning these two issues can involve iterative processes of shared debriefing, deconstructing and redefining key needs. The overall goal is to find win–wins that benefit the university, agency and oneself in carrying out research and disseminating practical knowledge in community-based organisational settings.

In order to identify mutually beneficial PR opportunities for social service organisational researchers, we propose a research agenda in the form of ten questions designed to promote speculation and dialogue as illustrated in Table 3 . The array of questions captures the tensions related to the different ways that practice researchers: engage and consider collaborating with possible agency partners; transition from the development of participatory research studies to their dissemination in complex agency contexts and sustain participatory studies in larger institutional settings. The questions seek to capture a lifecycle of participatory research projects at different stages of organisational development and across different contexts.

New directions for practice research-informed social service organisational analysis.

In summary, PR is a participatory, organisationally focused approach that combines the search for practice-relevant knowledge with qualitative and quantitative research methods in order to enhance services and promote organisational improvement in diverse contexts. PR therefore complements participatory methodologies as well as other applied social science methods used in social service organisational analysis. The future challenges include promoting more participatory studies of social service organisations as well as articulating additional perspectives on PR processes, applications and implications.

The authors would like to express their appreciation to the anonymous peer reviewers and Editors for their very helpful suggestions regarding the manuscript.

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• Introduction
• PAR in/for social work and approaches to collaboration
• What types of knowledge are produced by PAR in/for social work?
• The cycle for connecting experiences, evidence and exploration in CPRSW
• Evaluating CPRSW
• Collaborative environment: respectfulness, honesty and practitioner-led learning
• Flexibility and diversity
• Empowerment and ownership
• Pedagogy of discomfort in collaboration
• Acknowledgements
• Conflict of interest

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Collaborative practice research in social work: piloting a model for research and professional learning during COVID-19

Given the quintessentially collaborative nature of social work practice research, many researchers have explored the utility of participatory action research for promoting collaborative learning and knowledge production in social work. As a response to this call for participatory practice research methodology, we developed and piloted ‘collaborative practice research in social work’ in the project, ‘Empowering Social Workers in Challenging Times: Learning from Best Practice during COVID-19’. ‘Collaborative practice research in social work’ is a networked approach to social work participatory practice research, designed to integrate practice wisdom and research evidence to produce useful knowledge for social workers to practise ethically and effectively during COVID-19. This article will present some findings from the evaluation of ‘collaborative practice research in social work’, showing how the reversed sequence of involvement (practitioner researchers first and then academics) in research can enable practitioner-led learning, democratise knowledge production and help validate different types of knowledge in social work practice research. ‘Collaborative practice research in social work’ has demonstrated the need to address alienating academic practices that are not sensitive to the needs of practice or see practice as an afterthought. Findings further suggest the need to better prepare academic researchers to engage with participatory practice research, which can be an emotionally unsettling and unfamiliar research environment.

Social work practice research has established as a genre of social work research over the last three decades ( Thyer, 1989 ; Scott, 1990 ; Shaw, 2007 ), with the Salisbury Statement published in 2011 as one of the milestones ( Salisbury Forum Group, 2011 ). The statement marks a departure from the well-accepted notions of ‘scientific practitioner’ and evidence-based practice, which primarily promote research-led practice. Instead, the statement stipulates that it is a two-way road to bring research and practice closer to each other: making practice more research informed and research more practice near. Indicating that social work practitioner–academic collaboration is the preferred model of knowledge production, the statement invites further attention to the collaborative nature of social work practice research and the different modes of knowledge production, including ‘practice research’ and ‘practitioner research’ ( Mitchell et al, 2008 ; Uggerhøj, 2011 ).

The successive Helsinki Statement ( Nordic Social Work Research, 2014 ) for social work practice research turned the focus to developing practice-near research by involving service users, social workers and academics in the process of negotiating realities and producing useful knowledge. There is repeated emphasis on research methodology being participatory and dialogical for validating different forms of expertise. The idea of inclusivity and diversity, partly as a commitment to social justice but also as a way to provide a critical scholarship for social work practice research, was later extended to foregrounding the varied and varying political, cultural and social contexts where social work practice and research are undertaken, especially outside Western democracies (see Hong Kong Statement, Sim et al, 2019 ).

The synergy between social work practice research, given its quintessentially collaborative nature, and participatory action research (PAR) has been explored by many researchers. PAR, sometimes called ‘participatory research’ (PR), is a research approach that emphasises working ‘with’ instead of ‘on’ people. According to the UK Participatory Research Network (UKPRN) website, the aim of PAR/PR ‘is to maximize the participation of those whose life or work is the subject of the research’ ( UKPRN, n.d. ). Those traditionally seen as the receivers and users of knowledge are involved in the design, implementation and dissemination of research, making decisions on the knowledge production process to ensure the usefulness, relevance and workability of the produced knowledge ( Kong, 2016 ). The proliferation of this area of literature was evidenced by a simple keyword search for ‘social work’ AND ‘participatory action research’ on the Web of Science on 20 July 2022, resulting in 6,015 publications since 2011, with most of them published in the US (1,936), England (1,066), Canada (786), Australia (562) and Spain (354).

Informed by this body of research, we developed a novel approach to social work participatory practice research – ‘collaborative practice research for social work’ (CPRSW) – at the time of the COVID-19 pandemic in the UK. In August 2020, mirroring the rapid shift to remote and later hybrid practice in social work during the COVID-19 crisis ( Pink et al, 2021 ), the British Association of Social Workers (BASW) and Durham University acted swiftly to set up an online Social Work Practitioner Research Network for piloting CPRSW. The pilot of this new methodology was carried out under the project, ‘Empowering Social Workers in Challenging Times: Learning from Best Practice during COVID-19’, which is funded by the Economic and Social Research Council Impact Acceleration Account (ESRC IAA) and has been granted ethical approval by Durham University. The network initially consisted of six Durham University researchers and eight social workers from England and Wales (see Table 1 ). Keeping with a move from linear knowledge transfer to developing cooperative knowledge production ( Gray and Schubert, 2013 ), the network co-analysed 2,222 qualitative responses from UK social workers collected by the BASW’s ‘Ongoing Survey on Social Work during COVID-19’ (hereafter, the BASW survey) during the first COVID-19 national lockdown. The analysis captured UK social workers’ worries, challenges and good practice during the first COVID-19 national lockdown (March–August 2020) ( Kong et al, 2021a ) and informed the production of the reflective activist toolkit ( Kong et al, 2021b ), an article in a professional magazine and a research article ( Kong et al, 2021c ).

Demographics of interview participants

This article begins with an overview of how PAR has been applied in social work research to illustrate the novelty of CPRSW – an online networked approach to participatory practice research for collaborative learning. We then articulate the design and implementation of CPRSW, including how it was piloted and evaluated in the UK context. Based on the data collected in questionnaires and interviews with co-researchers in the pilot, we present analysis of the processes and outcomes of CPRSW to illustrate how it challenges existing epistemological hierarchy and promotes egalitarian knowledge production. In the discussion, we will consider the distinctiveness of our methodology in relation to similar approaches of participatory practice research and its value for wider application.

PAR in/for social work

This literature review on PAR in/for social work is based on the search results obtained by a Boolean search for journal articles published in English since 2011, the publication year of the Salisbury Statement. The initial search was performed on the Web of Science on 20 July 2022, having identified 6,015 publications that contains both ‘participatory action research’ AND ‘social work’ in their titles/abstracts. After excluding non-journal and non-English studies, we further narrowed down the publications to the social work field, resulting in 491 publications (see Appendix 1 1 ). It is worth noting that this is not a systematic review of PAR in social work but a literature review that helps situate CPRSW in the wider scheme of participatory social work practice research.

The identified set of literature has clearly demonstrated a wide range of application of PAR in understanding and advancing social work education and practice. PAR has been carried out in many fields of practice, such as community development, migration support, medical social work, trauma-informed practice, health–social care integration and health disparities, mental health, learning disabilities, youth work, domestic violence support, technology-assisted social work, ecosocial work, and decolonial/indigenous social work (see Appendix 1). McBeath et al ( 2021 ) considered PR as a social work-specific PAR approach, whereas Uggerhøj et al ( 2018 ) argues that PR might not be necessarily collaborative or participatory, though it might often involve social workers in one way or another.

In spite of great interest in using PAR to bring social work research and practice closer to each other, very few social work PAR studies explicitly link to the discussion of practice research, practitioner research or participatory practice research. Among the 491 articles on social work participatory research, only three explicitly mentioned ‘practice research’ and one mentioned ‘practitioner research’ in their titles/abstracts. In the following, we will present how PAR has been applied in social work research in terms of the approaches to collaboration and types of knowledge produced.

Most of the identified articles did not specify their PAR approach; rather, they treat it as a generic approach for involving social workers and/or service users from a single site or multiple sites of practice as steering committee members or co-researchers to shape and develop social work learning and intervention. There were also studies that do not embrace a full-on PAR but explore the utility of participatory methods, such as mapping, photovoice and participatory diagramming, for capturing marginalised voices. Among articles where specific PAR approaches are mentioned, community-based participatory research (CBPR) is the most cited one (119 articles). These studies involved service users, community practitioners and other community stakeholders in advocating for cultural, attitudinal, institutional and policy change, often associating themselves with critical and radical social work practice to justify their methodological choice. Often, these studies’ major goal was to enhance the communities’ capacity and social capital for learning, knowledge production and problem solving, reflecting the community work tradition of social work practice that might have been reduced significantly because of the neoliberalisation of social work profession ( Bortoletto, 2017 ; Westoby et al, 2019 ). Meanwhile, some other social work CBPR studies (15 articles) focus on decolonising social work and centring indigenous knowledge and their life-worlds. For example, Godden ( 2021 ) explored with indigenous communities in Peru the idea of ‘ buen vivir ’, which is a value-based love-driven framework for ‘living well’ with both people and nature. Feminist PAR (two articles) and appreciative inquiry (two articles) were also explicitly employed to work with, respectively, people who have experienced gender-based violence ( Johnson and Flynn, 2021 ), women living with HIV ( Greene et al, 2021 ) and sexual health disparities ( Loutfy et al, 2016 ), and people with disabilities ( Roy et al, 2021 ).

The approach to collaboration in these studies is primarily community/group based, carried out in a single site or multiple sites. Some collaboration required the formation of advisory groups, co-inquiry groups and action groups, whereas some were carried out with established community organisations or peer-led networks, for example, a Facebook group for young people to discuss mental health problems ( Gillard et al, 2014 ) and community-based organisations dealing with loss and death ( Kleijberg et al, 2020 ). Only two studies formed their own networks for promoting practice-based research: the Practice-Based Research Network in Los Angeles ( Kelly et al, 2015 ) and the Professional Collaboration Network ( Sage et al, 2021 ). We will return to issues these papers raise in the discussion to explore the potential of a networked approach to social work participatory practice research.

Through collaboration, co-researchers in social work PAR produced both theoretical and practical-ethical knowledge, aiming to improve intervention and service processes and outcomes, empower marginalised communities, centre indigenous voices and knowledge, offer critical views on structural oppression, provide alternative conceptualisation of key social work ideas, and develop new education and practice models/frameworks. McBeath et al ( 2021 ) contend that PAR in/for social work can produce professionally focused and organisationally situated knowledge through social work researcher–practitioner–manager–user collaboration. Banks et al ( 2021 ) also pointed out how PAR could build awareness of situated ethics in social work practice.

Fox et al ( 2021 ) argued that PAR can foster egalitarian knowledge exchange between academic researchers and practitioners, making a case for the important roles that ‘pracademics’/practitioner researchers play in transdisciplinary learning and producing both theoretical and practical knowledge. It might be harder to think about how academics involved in social work PAR could transgress the disciplinary boundaries to become ‘academic practitioners’, especially in countries and services where social work practice is narrowly defined as statutory work for adult and children safeguarding, such as the UK. While the possibility for academics to participate in action/practice might be more restricted in clinical or service-dependent practices, it is much more plausible at the community level of interventions. For example, in many CBPR studies included in this literature review, academics themselves have been involved in community organising (facilitating bonding, bridging and knowledge exchange) and mobilising social movements against racism, sexism and homophobia.

Literature on PAR in/for social work has pointed to the need for a more inclusive theorisation of participatory practice research, which features a spectrum of transdisciplinary learning and role taking. The current theorisation of participatory practice research suggests a division of labour between academic researchers and practitioner researchers, with the former leading research and the latter leading learning in their own practice ( Uggerhøj et al, 2018 ). However, this theorisation might be too restrictive for making sense of cross-site and cross-country learning, or participatory practice research carried out in non-clinical settings, such as in the place-based communities or communities organised around social and policy issues. The CPRSW in discussion is one of the few networked approaches for producing knowledge beyond one single site, with the aim to continuously redraw the established academic–practitioner/research–practice boundaries for producing relevant and useful knowledge.

CPRSW: rationale, design and processes

CPRSW, by design, is a network-based participatory approach to social work practice research. The networked approach was a response to some well-identified organisational barriers that hinder social workers’ participation in research, for example, the lack of research support, heavy workloads and lack of funding ( Harvey et al, 2013 ). By pooling together research and practice expertise in a network, social workers can find research support from their practitioner and academic peers who are not from their direct practice, and learn from the diverse skill sets owned by network members to develop knowledge and research skills relevant to addressing their intellectual and practical concerns. With all the meetings and trainings being accredited as continuous professional development (CPD) by the BASW, it also helps offset some of the extra workload that their participation in research might bring. External funding and resources coming from both impact-focused funding and the BASW further created learning opportunities that single service agencies might not be able to offer with their often very strained resources. This methodology thereby sees practice wisdom and research evidence as equally valid forms of knowing, and consistently seeks ways to integrate, link and utilise the two forms of knowing in practically and ethically meaningful ways for informing social work practice ( Kong, 2016 ; Kong et al, 2021b ).

Social workers’ experiences are both evidence and instruments for analysis: they are the former when the experiences are systematically collected for informing understanding of social work practice/theories/research; while they are the latter when social workers are involved in the interpretive process of data, drawing also on their practical insights and professional positional knowledge (as a front-line social worker, manager, practice educator or strategic planner for local authorities). This approach stipulates the roles of social workers’ experiences in producing theories for practice and theories from practice, and further suggests the possibility of linking these two types of research together through the cyclical process delineated in Figure 1 .

Collaborative Practice Research for Social Work is a methodology underpinned by the cycle of integrating experience, evidence and exploration

Citation: European Social Work Research 1, 1; 10.1332/XPUV7930

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In this methodology, social work practitioner researchers are supported to use their own experience to interpret research evidence, and these individual interpretations will be deliberated in small groups to generate possible consensus or identify differences. The deliberation process will help building theories from practice experiences and data. These local theories will further inform individual social workers’ exploration of and responses to the issue, verifying their validity and applicability in their own practice contexts. These new practice experiences will then shape social work practitioner researchers’ later interpretation of research evidence as the cycle goes on.

For ensuring egalitarian and democratic collaboration between social workers and academics in CPRSW, academic–practitioner collaboration started at the proposal development stage. Sui-Ting Kong from Durham University and Jane Shears from the BASW co-developed and implemented a three-phase process when piloting CPRSW, outlined in the following.

Phase 1: Practitioners learning and setting the research agenda

This took place when social workers’ face-to-face visits were halted and massive disruptions were caused in social care by both the COVID-19 pandemic and the constantly changing policies ( Kong et al, 2021a ). There was a huge demand for useful knowledge to guide practice in chaotic situations, and this project therefore set up the UK Social Work Practitioner Research Network for collaborative data analysis on the BASW survey. Eight social work practitioners from children and adult services in both England and Wales participated in setting the agenda for the research project and agreed on the training needed before academics joined the team at a later stage.

Phase 2: Practitioners getting training on research skills and prepared for handling data

In this phase, a CPD course was co-developed with network members, aiming to enhance practitioner researchers’ capacity to utilise secondary data to inform their practice during COVID-19. The CPD course consisted of training workshops on social work practitioner research, qualitative data analysis (coding, conceptualisation and collaborative analysis), NVivo demonstration and writing, co-delivered by Sui-Ting Kong, Jane Shears and Catrin Noone. (Catrin Noone is the researcher on the ‘Empowering Social Workers in Challenging Times’ project. She was responsible for coordinating the network meetings, supporting collaborative learning and carrying out preliminary data analysis. She also contributed to both the final report and academic outputs of the project.) The course also helped identify and develop a community of social workers interested in carrying out research in/for their practice by providing opportunities for them to network and share knowledge with other practitioner researchers. At the end of Phase 2, social work practitioner researchers held a general meeting to discuss their collaboration with university academic researchers and how best to conduct a co-analysis of the BASW survey.

Phase 3: Forming a team of practitioners and academics for co-analysis and co-writing

Academic researchers and practitioner researchers collaboratively analysed the data collected in the BASW survey. This process was facilitated by six joint meetings and six separate small working-group meetings. The former involved discussing the codes, concepts and themes emerging from the data analysis, while the latter was for individuals/groups to work on a set of data/concepts/themes. The data analysis was organised using the computer-assisted qualitative data analysis package NVivo 2020, and the NVivo file was made available for all co-researchers involved in this project to scrutinise/work on collaboratively.

This reversed sequence of involvement (practitioner researchers first and academic researchers second) embedded in the design aimed to empower social workers to feel comfortable to share their experiences, worries and challenges in undertaking research, and allowed sufficient time for practitioner researchers to get familiar with the data before the co-analysis began. Therefore, only in the third phase of the project did Durham University researchers join with the practitioner researchers to collaboratively analyse the data and produce materials useful for professional practice. The collaborative process led to outputs that targeted different audiences, including front-line social workers, social work managers and academics.

During the third phase of the project, Evgenia Stepanova joined the project as independent evaluator, aiming to assess the effectiveness of training and the quality of collaborative learning. Two practitioner researchers and two academic researchers, including all the authors of this article, formed an evaluation team to discuss, deepen and advance the initial analysis put forward by Evgenia Stepanova. Data used for evaluating CPRSW included:

five recordings of the CPD sessions in Phase 2;

two rounds of an online survey administered at the fourth and fifth months of the project (Phase 3), with eight responses collected from the first sweep of the survey and three responses collected in the second sweep of the total of 14 active co-researchers; and

eight qualitative interviews (also referred to as conversations) carried out with four practitioner researchers and four academic researchers to explore their experiences, views and motivations for joining the project, as well as perceived outcomes on their personal and professional development.

Thematic analysis was performed with the aid of NVivo 12. Emerging themes were presented back to the wider network in five of the regular meetings to get feedback and ensure their relevance and closeness to practitioner researchers’ experiences. The evaluation of CPRSW forms the part of the analysis elucidated in this article.

The CPRSW approach created a collaborative environment that allowed participants to engage with one another with honesty and mutual respect. This environment was sustained by agreeing on and enforcing ground rules for respectful exchanges. This was particularly important when dealing with disagreements in interpreting research findings and inferring the causes for some observations. An example is when the network was discussing why mental health services suffered disproportionately during the pandemic and adult social workers and children social workers put forward drastically different explanations: the former attributed the lack of resources in adult services to an overemphasis on child protection, whereas the latter felt that it was just a matter of increased demands and maintained that children should take priority. Ground rules helped contain the tension and allowed the facilitator to explore different plausible explanations with the group that were less antagonising.

The collaborative environment also depends on building relationships that are ‘founded on a shared purpose: [professional] development’ ( Wallerstein and Martinez, 1994 : 313). Many practitioner researchers spoke of the common experience of not having a strong research culture at their workplace and their eagerness to expand and exercise their research skills in and on social work practice as their major motivation to participate in the network. Several practitioner researchers reported that they perceived the project meeting as “something to look forward to” and often viewed the meetings as rewarding. Being online and across services by design, the network approach clearly provided the opportunity for social workers from different service units and different parts of the country to collaborate on a social work research project. The professionally diverse but like-minded group became a safe space for practitioner researchers to share their professional observations, thoughts and feelings, which can sometimes be misinterpreted as criticism in one’s workplace. Honest exchange is crucial for contextualising findings about social workers’ experiences during COVID-19. Some potentially sensitive topics discussed in the network included the inadequacy of support from senior management, the influence of politics on COVID-19 measures, the lack of protection for the most vulnerable, austerity and the neoliberalisation of adult and children services.

Through having social work practitioners join the project and co-develop the research and learning agenda before joining up with the wider group of academics, the project tailored learning opportunities to suit individual practitioners’ preferences and needs. Mapping out the research process alongside practitioner researchers’ interests and skills led to training sessions on participatory research, thematic analysis and the use of NVivo. Academic researchers joining later in the project were briefed about the research agenda and training that took place in the project group, creating a reversed sequence of involvement compared to conventional research led by academic researchers.

‘It’s just a way that you can come to it when you’re ready. And I think that’s, to me is how participation should work. It shouldn’t be a linear process with people all participating in the same way for the same amount of time. We have to create environments that support people to participate on their own terms. And I think that worked pretty well for us [and] for academics. Because otherwise, I think a lot of people would have been caught off balance.’ (Emily, academic researcher)

While some co-researchers had less time to engage in data analysis, there were also those who wanted to gain experience of analysing data with NVivo. Depending on the project phase, participants met as often as once a week to once a month. All sessions were designed as group work, with smaller breakout group and joint discussions. These opportunities to collaborate allowed participants to establish good relationships with other co-researchers and take on shared responsibility for a research task: ‘Having insight from across disciplines is brilliant. Everyone has something to offer and it’s great to build the network and see what we all can contribute’ (anonymous response to questionnaire).

The variety of project activities, such as co-producing policy briefs, practice guidance and reports, as well as launching webinars, further created space for participants’ voices to be heard. They allowed various ways to contribute to the research outputs and express one’s opinions. Practitioner researchers, such as Anne, said that they felt CPRSW had been “a genuine attempt at collaboration, rather than a tokenistic attempt”, and contested their preconceived idea that research was about academics leading, with practitioners only “allowed to do tiny bits of it”. The varied outputs also diversify learning opportunities to suit the skills and learning needs of individuals. Instead of prioritising academic outputs, which are often written in jarring language and might not serve the purpose of aiding practice in critical times, diversified outputs enabled co-researchers with diverse interests to invest themselves in the process, which motivated them to participate in the knowledge production and dissemination processes that speak to their professional learning goals.

‘I was supported and assisted to be able to offer … you can tell I wasn’t confident about those areas of the journey…. I think that [I] shy away from that. I was able to kind of say, “Look, this is what I’m saying.” And I was helped to work through it because I had some negative thoughts.’ (Kate, practitioner researcher)

The flexibility and diversity in learning, previously discussed, led to other positive outcomes for participating individuals: feeling empowered and belonging. Democratic decision-making mechanisms, the practitioner-led and practice-oriented learning processes, and research activities for integrating experience and evidence afforded a sense of control and ownership among practitioner researchers. These empowering practices are embedded in the project design but need to be backed up by ensuring co-researchers’ equal access to resources and fair recognition of each other’s contribution in both the processes and the outputs.

By analysing the ‘empowering moments’ expressed by co-researchers, it has become clear to us that those opportunities to speak for themselves and to be heard are crucial to dismantling epistemic hierarchy: “I felt very valued in contributions that I can make. And that’s felt quite genuine and quite authentic. I mean, you are key figures in this project in the first place” (Anne, practitioner researcher). Instead of leading the research activities, academics facilitated and enabled practitioners to make best use of their practical experience, professional insights and analytical skills to interpret data. Thus, practitioners saw that their voices mattered, ‘views are valued’ and they could ‘influence the course of events’. Better integration of practice experience and front-line observations in social work practice research is of paramount importance for producing relevant, useful and up-to-date knowledge, especially amid the public health crisis of a pandemic, when systematic data collection is challenging and the situations are complex and rapidly developing.

The reversed sequence of involvement in the CPRSW process also unsettled the assumptions that academics always know better and more about how research should be done. Since practitioner researchers had time to prepare themselves in advance of the co-analysis with academics, they felt less intimidated when engaging in research dialogues at a later stage, whereas academics were put in a situation where they needed to acquire skills for collaborative learning, which could make them feel left behind: “I think that social workers always feel intimidated by academics, and in order to avoid that, the social workers had more, sort of, power and flexibility from the start, but it led to academics being left behind” (Tara, academic researcher).

‘It’s really good to speak to people who are looking at issues, deeply reviewing, surveying the literature that’s around. And there is a huge amount all over the world and certainly in England and in Britain as well. So, it’s really good to actually not only be able to read things that people have written like yourselves from but actually to be able to converse with people and have dialogue with people, and looking at up-to-date ideas.’ (Amit, practitioner researcher)

However, the larger joint meetings “with the very experienced academics” are still “slightly more intimidating” than small group discussions, as noted in the anonymous evaluation questionnaires.

Practitioner researchers reported that enthusiasm, individual attention to each researcher and the strong commitment of the project leader served as powerful forces for learning and collaboration. This might indicate the need for the initiating researcher of CPRSW to personalise support and encourage the expression of opinions in due process, demonstrating the criticality of an ethics of care to participatory research ( Gilligan, 1993 ; Banks, 2013 ). Acknowledging and responding to individual researchers’ differences in terms of their level of practice and research skills, experiences, level of confidence, views and perspectives, and life circumstances, it was found by many co-researchers that they felt they had “equal opportunity to develop either knowledge or skills, or any other valuable aspects” (quotes taken from the anonymous evaluation questionnaires), in the CPRSW pilot.

The reversed sequence of involvement and a focus on empowering practitioner researchers in CPRSW are strategies to swap the ownership and leadership in the process/structure for knowledge production, but they also engendered uncomfortable emotions among academics. Feelings of unease and confusion, as well as a sense of misplacement, were expressed by academics when they first joined the project: “I suppose I felt when I went, you know, when asked to go to the online meeting, I felt rather unprepared. Do you know the expression? Yes, and I am happy to wing it, but I am not sure.… It just is simply, it’s just an unusual experience” (Alena, academic researcher). Some practitioner researchers were aware of the unease and sense of discomfort felt by academic researchers. They described academics’ experience in CPRSW as “sweating” at first but maintained that there was a “balance” in participation in general and “the journey was in the right direction” (quotes from the anonymous evaluation questionnaires).

Interviewer: ‘If it wasn’t titled “collaborative focus groups”, what would you call it?’ Alena (academic): ‘Well, I just, I didn’t recognise any of the qualities of focus group…. I mean, it may be that I’ve got a very old-fashioned view of focus groups, but I suppose I’m very tied to Morgan’s work on focus groups. That for me, focus group is a way [that] you are trying to generate ideas of thinking and experiences, ideas, thinking from different people in a group about a particular area. Yeah, I’ve never been– If it was called “collaborative data analysis”, I would have understood it.’

The experience and feelings of Alena indicated the need to better prepare academics in participating in collaborative research with practitioners, especially when practitioners also take on the role as researchers, whereas not all academics maintain their participation in practice. In response to that, Tara, an academic researcher, suggested: “But I think for the academics to be introduced to the practitioner research group on day one of the CPD, and plus some of the academics who were going to be involved later, could perhaps have done one or two short training sessions.” Introducing academics to the team at the beginning and negotiating the openness of the CPD training for academic researchers might be helpful for preparing academics for collaborative learning in CPRSW. Creating a separate space for academics to identify and articulate the discomfort, and to enable reflection on the structure and root causes of these feelings, will be needed in future implementation of CPRSW, drawing on the pedagogy of discomfort ( Boler, 1999 ; Nadan and Stark, 2017 ).

Research and practice integration has long been a priority in health and social care. Within social work, there have been various approaches developed over the years to achieve this goal, namely, practice-near research ( Cooper, 2009 ; Winter et al, 2015 ), evidence-based/informed practice ( Epstein, 2011 ; Thyer and Meyers, 2011 ), social work implementation science ( Cabassa, 2016 ), practice research ( Julkunen and Uggerhøj, 2016 ), practitioner research ( Shaw, 2005 ; Shaw and Lunt, 2012 ) and service user-led research ( Beresford, 2013 ; Boxall and Beresford, 2013 ). While some of these approaches emphasise what types of knowledge should count, some others focus on who should be doing research/producing knowledge. What is common to these diverse responses is the involvement of different stakeholders: social work practitioners, service users and carers. They are involved, at the minimum, in the dissemination and utilisation of the research evidence, and, at most, in co-production and practice.

A networked approach to social work participatory research is a rather unusual one. Existing literature on similar approaches shows that they are either service specific ( Kelly et al, 2015 ) or have a focus on knowledge dissemination and utilisation, rather than knowledge production ( Sage et al, 2021 ). Kelly et al ( 2015 ) set up the Recovery-Oriented Care Collaborative, as one of the other 152 established practice-based research networks (PBRNs) in the US, for fostering collaboration between academic researchers, clinicians and mental health practitioners in learning and research. Sage et al ( 2021 ) set up professional collaborative networks (PCNs) to enhance the social capital, relational capital and digital literacy of social work students, and hence the social work workforce, for utilising research knowledge. Unlike CPRSW, these approaches aim to make practice more evidence based/informed but do not address alienating academic practices that are not sensitive to the needs of practice or see practice as an afterthought. Neither do they challenge the research-to-practice direction of knowledge transfer, leaving practice knowledge still at the bottom of the knowledge hierarchy.

CPRSW addresses both the epistemological and social hierarchies in social work knowledge production, which are characterised by practice wisdom, tacit knowledge and practical experience being seen as less valid than research evidence and theories. CPRSW advocates for the validation of experience and evidence as equally relevant to social work professional knowledge development: first, by seeing experience as both data and instrument for interpreting and contextualising research data; and, second, by acknowledging practitioners’ roles in setting the research agenda, data analysis, writing up and disseminating research when given the right environment and support. This can be seen as a type of participatory practice research that does not, however, conform to the traditional division of labour between practitioner researchers and academic researchers, with the former responsible for professional learning and the latter for research and theoretical development ( Uggerhøj et al, 2018 ).

Evaluation of the pilot of CPRSW shows that the reversed sequence of involvement in a collaborative research process can increase the confidence, research capacity and motivation of practitioner researchers in conducting research. Flexibility in participation and diversity in research activities allowed personalised professional learning and a no-blame environment for collaboration. Academics and social workers can take part on their own terms, work together in self-selecting groups where they may express and defend their views, and participate in a variety of challenging analytical and writing tasks. To practitioner researchers, CPRSW provided an egalitarian learning environment where there existed a safe space and social connectedness. However, academics expressed unsettling emotions in such an unfamiliar research environment, highlighting the need for a better understanding of these emotions, their causes and ways to critically reflect on them for making research practice near. Further research is necessary to explore how to convert this discomfort into a pedagogic resource for challenging stereotypes of the ‘others’ in social work learning and research.

Regarding the challenges of a networked approach to participatory practice research, key issues are the representation of the workforce and the ambiguous roles of academic researchers. While the network of self-selecting participants might not be representative of the social work workforce and the professional learning needs of those who do not/cannot participate. Membership of the network is fluid and can shrink or expand unexpectedly, which can affect the network’s scheduled work programme, leaving a question of who gets to take up the work left to be done. Building sufficient resources and human power into a CPRSW project is therefore essential for its success. Rethinking the roles of academics in this approach will be needed if we want to prepare academics better to enter this process and to enable them to see how their research skills and knowledge in theory could help give voice to tacit knowledge and practice wisdom, which are often unarticulated and unheard in social work literature ( Kong et al, 2021c ). The learnings from piloting CPRSW also point to the importance of building infrastructure, interactive space and skills for transdisciplinary learning, underpinned by the equal participation of multiple stakeholders, as part of the agenda for democratising social work practice research.

https://figshare.com/articles/dataset/Participatory_Research_and_Social_Work_xls/22188823

This work was supported by the ESRC IAA and the BASW.

We would like to thank Angelic Quintana, Cherryl Pharoah, Diane Wills, Jane Shears, Kerry Sildatke, Wendy Roberts, Helen Charnley, Roger Smith, Sarah Banks and Susie Hawkes who collaborated with us in the Empowering Social Work during COVID-19 project and offered incredible insights into the lives of social workers in this trying time. Our gratitude is extended to those who completed the BASW Survey on Social Work during COVID-19. Without their contribution, our project and this article will not be possible.

The authors declare that there is no conflict of interest.

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• v.12(6); 2022

Original research

Collaboration between general practitioners and social workers: a scoping review, cornelia löwe.

University Hospital / Institute of General Practice and Family Medicine, Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universitat Bonn, Bonn, Germany

Patrick Mark

Samira sommer, birgitta weltermann, associated data.

bmjopen-2022-062144supp002.pdf

bmjopen-2022-062144supp001.pdf

No data are available.

Aim of the study is to present an overview of collaboration structures and processes between general practitioners and social workers, the target groups addressed as well the quality of available scientific literature.

A scoping review following the guidelines of the PRISMA-ScR (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses extension for Scoping Reviews).

Included sources and articles

According to a pre-published protocol, three databases (PubMed, Web of Science, DZI SoLit) were searched using the participant-concept-context framework. The searches were performed on 21 January 2021 and on 10 August 2021. Literature written in English and German since the year 2000 was included. Two independent researchers screened all abstracts for collaboration between general practitioners and social workers. Articles selected were analysed regarding structures, processes, outcomes, effectiveness and patient target groups.

A total of 72 articles from 17 countries were identified. Collaborative structures and their routine differ markedly between healthcare systems: 36 publications present collaboration structures and 33 articles allow an insight into the processual routines. For all quantitative studies, a level of evidence was assigned. Various measurements are used to determine the effectiveness of collaborations, for example, hospital admissions and professionals’ job satisfaction. Case management as person-centred care for defined patient groups is a central aspect of all identified collaborations between general practitioners and social workers.

This scoping review showed evidence for benefits on behalf of patients, professionals and healthcare systems by collaborations between general practitioners and social workers, yet more rigorous research is needed to better understand the impact of these collaborations.

Trial registration number

www.osf.io/w673q .

Strengths and limitations of this study

• Using the PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses) extension for Scoping Reviews, this study provides a detailed view of interprofessional collaborations between general practitioners (GPs) and social workers.
• Measurements allowing for the evaluation of collaborative models are outlined.
• Articles included refer to the involvement of social workers in care processes for patients together with GPs without addressing social work from a bigger perspective.
• Despite the systematic approach, a risk of bias in the appraisal of the data cannot be fully excluded.

Introduction

A 2021 bulletin of the WHO attributes 30%–55% of health outcomes to social determinants of health (SDH). 1 Social factors are relevant as risk and protective factors. For example, longitudinal data associated with the German Socio-Economic Panel Study from 1995 until 2005 including 31 800 adults showed a remarkably lower healthy life expectancy for low income compared with high income: stratified by gender a reduction of 10 years for women and more than 14 years for men is described. 2 The 2008 Japan Public Health Center-based Prospective Study with 44 152 individuals demonstrated a 1.45-fold higher risk of stroke mortality for socially isolated men and women. 3 All social stressors enhance the risk of strain-related diseases. 4 Thus, the appropriate address of SDH is fundamental for improving health and reducing inequities that require collaborative action through all sectors. 1

General practitioners (GPs) treat patients with various social issues and different social contexts. 5 Cross-sectional studies outlined common psychosocial problems that are frequent in general practice: for example, job problems, unemployment, intrafamilial problems or loneliness. 6 GPs report that patients with SDH require higher consultation times. 6 7 In recent qualitative research, German GPs reported feeling helpless when confronted with SDH which results in unmet care needs. 8 9 In the last years, cooperation structures between GPs and social care professionals are emerging and range from pilot projects to routine implementations in selected countries or districts. 10–13

Collaborations between GPs and social workers (SWs) are especially promising as both professions provide low-threshold, person-centred support. Like medicine, social work is based on the interaction of individuals and organisations dedicated to welfare in the state and society. 14 As human rights profession, it has a political and anti-discriminatory function that can strengthen social justice. 15 Social work professionals have a long tradition of cooperation with the medical profession in various healthcare institutions, for example, hospitals. 16 17

A 2018 systematic review by Fraser et al outlined the potential of collaborations between SWs and GPs based on 26 randomised control trials: integrated care improved patients’ behavioural health outcomes and care processes significantly compared with routine primary care services without SW. 18 According to a 2017/2018 survey of 80 German SWs, SWs believe that their patient-related work will be improved by collaborations with GPs. 19 Similarly, GPs are interested in cooperations with SWs, but various barriers exist. 20 Internationally, different forms of collaborations between SWs and GPs exist, yet no review is available. This scoping review addresses collaborations between GPs and SWs, focusing on their structures, processes, patient target groups and effectiveness.

This scoping review followed the Joanna Briggs Institute methodology for reviews 21–23 and the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses extension for Scoping Reviews (PRISMA-ScR). 24 The format of a scoping review was chosen because the available literature is heterogenous regarding content and methodologies, which does not allow for a systematic review or meta-analysis.

Protocol and registration

A protocol was registered prior to the review in Open Science Framework.

Eligibility criteria

This review aims at the wide range of interprofessional cooperation between GPs and SWs. Therefore, all study types published in English and German since 2000 were included.

Information sources and search strategy

Search parameters were defined based on the ‘P-C-C’-approach (Population—Concept—Context). 21 24 The following search terms were selected on a meta-level:

• Professional group #1: general practitioners.
• Professional group #2: social worker.
• Collaboration.
• Dimension, for example, setting, community.
• Known structures, for example, integrated care.

A combination of keywords was selected to link both professions or contexts to the concept. The details on keywords and their combinations are provided as online supplemental material 1 (Search strategy). Three well-known databases were searched: PubMed, DZI SoLit and Web of Science. PubMed was chosen as one of the most important databases for medicine worldwide. DZI SoLit is one of the most important libraries for social work in German-speaking countries and is curated by the German Central Institute for Social Issues (DZI) in Berlin. In the Web of Science Core Collection, the ‘Social Work’ category was searched to identify international evidence in the area of social work practice. A pilot search in the database PubMed provided an enormous data volume; therefore we changed from a ‘MesH Terms’ to a ‘Title/Abstract’ search. The same key term combination was applied in the Web of Science. In the German Central Institute for Social Issues, a librarian searched the internal database according to our keyword combinations. The search was piloted on 21 January 2021, the final search was conducted on 10 August 2021.

Supplementary data

Study selection, data charting and methodological quality appraisal.

After removing duplicates, two reviewers jointly developed a template for preselection: all abstracts were screened using the P-C-C criteria: population, collaboration concept, context. The two reviewers charted the data independently and discussed the results thereafter. Following the study protocol, all selected articles were analysed in full-text and categorised regarding the following five aspects:

• Collaboration structure/model.
• Patient population addressed (target group).
• (Functional) Impairment of patients.
• Setting/country.
• Measurements used to describe a collaboration’s effectiveness. 25

Classifications of all articles were documented using a literature management program (QSR CITAVI V.6.10). All quantitative studies were rated for their methodology using the Agency for Health Care Policy and Research (AHCPR) levels of evidence 26 by two researchers with a final review of a senior researcher.

Summarising and reporting the results

Our qualitative content analysis clustered every source regarding ‘structure’ (eg, general practice, primary care centre), ‘process’ (eg, collaboration frame, roles, responsibilities) and ‘target groups’ (eg, vulnerable groups, functional health). This summary allows for a correlative view of single articles and thematic clusters.

Risk of bias assessment

This scoping review does not intend to appraise the risk of bias of the studies analysed. 27

Patient and public involvement

No patient involved.

Selection of sources of evidence, exclusion criteria and study characteristics

The searches retrieved 1136 references. After removing duplicates, 1119 references remained for preselection of which 882 were excluded for the following reasons (exclusion criteria):

• References addressing diseases or temporary life circumstances that typically do not require social work intervention (eg, maternity care, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease);
• References describing inter professional collaboration on a metalevel without addressing GPs and SWs specifically;
• References about SW practices without collaborations with GPs, and
• References from patients’ perspective not addressing collaborations.

The remaining 227 articles were imported into a literature management programme for full-text analysis. During this process, all articles beyond the focus of this scoping review also were excluded:

• Articles that describe social interventions without SWs (n=56),
• Descriptions of health and social structures without collaboration between GPs and SWs (n=37),
• Articles not involving the GP settings: in-hospital setting (n=17), paediatric setting, including child protection and child/youth psychiatry (n=18), emergency setting (n=5) and nursing homes (n=12).

The flow chart ( figure 1 ) summarises the process of article selection.

PRISMA flow diagram. GP, general practitioner; P-C-C, Population—Concept—Context; PRISMA, Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses; SW, social worker.

Seventy-two articles from 17 countries were included in the review; 37.5% of the articles originated from North America (n=27), 26.4% from the UK (n=19) and 15.3% from German-speaking countries (n=11). In descending order, the article types were: qualitative studies (n=24, 33.3%); programme/project descriptions (n=11, 15.3%), mixed-methods studies (n=10, 13.9%), quantitative studies (n=8, 11.1%), narrative reviews/expert opinion (n=7, 9.7%), feasibility studies (n=5, 6.9%), systematic or scoping reviews (n=5; 6.9%), one reference book and one study protocol. Nearly half of all articles were published since 2018. The study characteristics are outlined in online supplemental table 1 .

Levels of evidence (AHCPR) and measurements

An evidence level was assigned to 25 studies and 3 systematic reviews. The latter showed a level Ia evidence. 18 28 29 Additional 4 studies had high levels of evidence: a randomised controlled trial with mixed-methods design 30 was marked with level Ib. A level IIb was assigned three times: for a longitudinal cohort study, 31 an interventional non-randomised cohort study 32 and a quasi-experimental study. 33 For the remaining 44 articles, the level of evidence grading was not applicable.

Overall, studies used different measurements. In 23 studies, instruments to measure processes and/or outcomes were mentioned. Nine of 12 studies used standardised instruments to measure patients’ psychosocial needs and/or physical functioning, 30 33–40 while the remaining 3 studies did not specify the instruments used. Eight studies measured patients’ healthcare utilisation including hospital (re-)admissions and the frequencies of emergency department visits. 30–33 37 38 41 42 In addition, characteristics of collaborative processes were measured, for example, the number of referrals, 37 39 43 44 team climate, team development 32 45–47 and professionals’ job satisfaction. 31–33 46 48 49 Cost-effectiveness measurements were addressed in three studies. 30 45 50

Collaboration structures and the degree of implementation

Collaborations between SWs and GPs differ markedly between healthcare systems. We categorised collaborations in: collaboration within the same practice/institution (eg, community health centre, interprofessional practice) (n=17) 35 38 40 46 48 50–61 and collaboration of GPs and SWs from separate institutions (eg, GPs from a practice collaborating with SWs employed by a public institution) (n=21). 8 20 35 41 42 44 45 52 62–74

The degree of routine implementation of the several collaborations varies between healthcare systems. The two most advanced collaborations are realised in the UK and Canada. Routine enactment is implemented in the UK, in particular established with social prescribing 66 75 and Primary Care Networks 76 embedded in the National Health Service (NHS) Long Term Plan. 77 In Ontario, Canada, Family Health Teams provide community-oriented primary health services. 43 55 78 In Germany, GPs and SWs collaborate in specialised practices, for example, for patients with addiction disorders including alcohol dependency, 44 69 yet there are no routine collaborations between GPs and SWs. Regional models for special patient groups like patients with addiction are also emerging in Switzerland. 67 Primary Care Social Work as part of primary healthcare teams is also described from Ireland 49 as a community-oriented implementation. 79 Table 1 outlines the details for the respective publications.

Structures of collaboration between general practitioners and social workers, n=36

AHCPR, Agency for Health Care Policy and Research; n.a., not applicable; Ref, reference.

Processes of collaboration

All collaborations between GPs and SWs target special patient groups in form of the case and care management which were described in more detail in 49 of these 72 articles.

Specific formats of collaborations were identified in 33 articles:

• Joint discussions, for example, round tables and team meetings (n=21) 18 28 30 32 38 42 43 45 47 52 58 60 65 67 70–72 74 80–82 ;
• Referrals from GP practice or interprofessional groups to SWs (n=11), 32 41 44 52 54 58 59 66 69 80 83 which sometimes is phrased as ‘social prescribing’ in the literature;
• Vice versa, referral from SWs to the primary care setting/GP practice (n=5). 34 51 63 84 85

Surprisingly, these processes are already implemented routinely in some countries, for example, the UK. Details are presented in table 2 .

Processes of collaboration between general practitioners and social workers, n=33

*Social prescribing.

It is remarkable that the majority of articles from the category ‘referral from social worker to general practice or interprofessional groups’ were published since 2019. We used the term ‘referral’ to describe any recommendation to contact and/or interact with another healthcare professional. In some settings, the term ‘social prescribing’ is used instead. For example, social prescribing is a key component of universal personalised care in the NHS 11 and a prime example of collaboration between GPs and SWs. Also, different terms are used to describe the roles of SWs, for example, ‘informal broker’ 85 or ‘accompaniment’. 63

Target groups

According to our synthesis, collaborative care is targeting special patient groups with high needs, such as geriatric patients and those with mental health problems. The frequencies of the various target groups addressed are presented in figure 2 based on a total of 46 articles. In five of these publications, several target groups are addressed. Geriatric patients are focused in 22 articles 8 28–30 32 33 35 38–40 51 52 54 64 65 68 70 71 74 80 86 87 with additional five articles specifically addressing geropsychiatric patients. 36 43 45 84 88 Other risk groups are adults with complex care needs (n=10) 9 38 51 52 59 61 62 78 89 90 as well as those requiring palliative (n=2) 34 41 and oncological (n=1) care. 37 Mental diseases are addressed in nine articles, 36 42 48 50 63 72 82 84 91 while an additional five articles detail collaboration issues for patients affected by addiction. 44 67 69 92 93

Target groups of collaboration between general practitioners and social workers, n=46.

Our scoping review showed that patient-centred case management is central in professional collaborations between GPs and SWs from various countries. However, otherwise, such collaborations differ by structure, process and patient target groups. Also, the degree of scientific evaluation and evidence of the effectiveness, as well as the routine implementation of the described collaborations, varies markedly.

Currently, the highest evidence for effective collaborations between GPs and SWs is described in a longitudinal US cohort study published in 2019 which included 4230 patients with 167 care professionals including both professional groups. Higher connectedness and higher access to other providers in the community significantly reduced inpatient hospitalisations and emergency department visits. 31 Also in the USA, similar results were achieved by the 2014 adaption of the ‘Geriatric Resources for Assessment and Care of Elders (GRACE)’ model, 94 which increased patients’ quality of life and decreased hospitalisation rates. 38

Aiming at the best possible integrated care for various patient groups, many studies address the roles and interactions of the participating professionals. 35 46 64 86 Schultz et al emphasise the need to clearly define the roles of all professionals involved to ensure integrated care in the best possible way. 62 This requires appropriate interprofessional education. 52 64 78 80 84 Knowledge about each other creates an increased awareness of the importance of collaborative skill development which needs to be reflected in curricula for GP and SW education. 95 96 Within and between institutions, and organisational learning culture is needed to support integrated care by interprofessional teams. 97

Our literature review showed that current collaborative models mainly target geriatric and psychiatric patients. However, SDH are much broader, and even highly prevalent problems such as functional health, loneliness, debts, family problems and violence have not been addressed in studies although these are known to negatively influence health outcomes. 98–100

Strengths and limitations

A detailed search and analysis of the heterogenous articles retrieved were carried out following the PRISMA-ScR guideline. Based on the P-C-C approach, a detailed view of various aspects of collaborations between GPs and SWs was presented. Various formats for collaborative, person-centred care processes were highlighted. Measurements allowing for the evaluation of collaborative models were outlined. Articles included refer to the involvement of SWs in care processes for patients together with GPs without addressing SW from a bigger perspective. Despite the systematic approach, a risk of bias in the appraisal of the data cannot be fully excluded.

Conclusion and perspectives

This scoping review outlined models and strategies to improve SDH by collaborations between GPs and SWs. For transferability, the described best practice models need to be shaped for the respective healthcare system. Although a lack of rigorous research in this field was documented, there is profound evidence of benefits on behalf of patients, professionals and healthcare systems by close collaborations between GPs and SWs. Future research needs to measure the impact of different forms of collaboration in healthcare systems.

Supplementary Material

Acknowledgments.

We thank the librarian of the German Central Institute for Social Issues, Mrs Lingott, for the good collaboration.

Contributors: CL and BW developed the research question and study design. CL curated the data. CL and PM reviewed all records and analyzed the data. CL, PM, SS and BW interpreted the data and results. BW supervised the process and functions as guarantor. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

Funding: The authors have not declared a specific grant for this research from any funding agency in the public, commercial or not-for-profit sectors.

Competing interests: None declared.

Patient and public involvement: Patients and/or the public were not involved in the design, or conduct, or reporting, or dissemination plans of this research.

Provenance and peer review: Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.

Supplemental material: This content has been supplied by the author(s). It has not been vetted by BMJ Publishing Group Limited (BMJ) and may not have been peer-reviewed. Any opinions or recommendations discussed are solely those of the author(s) and are not endorsed by BMJ. BMJ disclaims all liability and responsibility arising from any reliance placed on the content. Where the content includes any translated material, BMJ does not warrant the accuracy and reliability of the translations (including but not limited to local regulations, clinical guidelines, terminology, drug names and drug dosages), and is not responsible for any error and/or omissions arising from translation and adaptation or otherwise.

Data availability statement

Ethics statements, patient consent for publication.

Not applicable.

Ethics approval

The Importance of Interdisciplinary Collaboration in Social Work

Hospital social workers coordinate with assisted living facilities to ensure smooth transitions for discharged patients. Child welfare social workers strategize with foster care agencies to find solutions for children in danger. Interdisciplinary collaboration in social work makes for effective, holistic care, allowing social workers to draw on the expertise of multiple professions and dive into a wide pool of resources.

Benefits of Collaborative Partnerships

To tackle complex issues, social workers must collaborate with professionals in other industries and disciplines. When social workers collaborate with other professions, clients benefit from a wider range of support and gain access to more resources. Additionally, sharing responsibility and pooling knowledge allows social workers to better navigate barriers to getting a job done.

For example, social workers collaborating with housing agency representatives can help clients experiencing housing insecurity stabilize their situations. This partnership can make information about subsidized housing or rent payment assistance programs easier to access. This partnership can also streamline the public housing application process.

The Unique Role of Social Workers in Collaborative Teams

Within collaborative teams, social workers offer unique insights. Their skills allow them to see the circumstances of individuals that are not immediately visible to others. They have a special perspective on how individuals fit into and are affected by systems. Social workers provide a person-centered approach, which involves meeting people where they are in a given situation. This allows the social worker to validate what is happening in the person’s life and assist with effective problem-solving. By helping their team members understand the challenges patients encounter to accessing care, social workers lay important groundwork. They give health care providers the insight to better plan for and address the barriers to patients getting the care they need.

For example, social workers share with teams about patients’ financial constraints, language barriers or cultural differences that might get in the way of following medical advice. The team can then brainstorm solutions and find appropriate alternative approaches.

Interdisciplinary Collaboration in Action

The expertise of community leaders, medical professionals, lawyers, caregivers, school administrators and others informs social workers’ decisions in significant ways. Through these partnerships, social workers build client resource networks that improve social conditions and health outcomes. Social work interdisciplinary collaboration also allows for collective problem-solving.

Working together, social workers and other professionals define common goals, pool resources, and share responsibilities to achieve those goals. This involves strategic planning as stakeholders determine how they’ll rely on one another, seek out one another’s expertise and implement a plan.

Consider child welfare social workers who team up with school officials, community organizers and mental health providers to keep children safe. These teams strategize techniques for early identification of children and families in need. They designate roles and responsibilities to fast-track intervention services such as counseling or programs that teach parenting and family relationship skills.

When teams share responsibility for identifying issues and delivering treatment, they help better ensure children’s safety in general.

Examples of Interdisciplinary Collaborative Teams

Why do interdisciplinary collaborative teams matter? Consider the following examples.

Massachusetts Child Psychiatry Access Program

The Massachusetts Child Psychiatry Access Program (MCPAP) pairs pediatricians with teams of child psychiatrists, social workers and care coordinators to improve children’s access to mental health care. If a child experiences a mental health issue, the pediatrician consults with the team. Teams advise pediatricians about available resources, services and programs.

Missouri Coalition for Community Behavioral Healthcare

Missouri’s community mental health centers have created interdisciplinary care teams of social workers, primary care nurses and behavioral health professionals. The teams collaborate to manage cases and educate patients, serving as gateways for clients seeking behavioral and primary health services.

Promoting Interdisciplinary Collaboration in Social Work Practice

Social workers looking to expand their areas of expertise and promote collaboration throughout their practice should consider key advice.

Get to Know the Team’s Disciplines

Social workers should cultivate an understanding of their teams’ various disciplines. This understanding involves recognizing the differences in practice norms, philosophies and ethical standards among the disciplines. Knowing the players on an interdisciplinary team facilitates communication.

Be Flexible

Variations in training and approach among the disciplines can lead to different expectations and conflicting ideas. Recognizing these differences and responding with flexibility will help social workers find common ground and strengthen relationships. It also prepares social workers to compromise, a necessity for successful interdisciplinary collaboration.

Nurture an Innovative Practice

To stay innovative and inspired in their practice, social workers should engage in scholarly reading, keep up-to-date with research, and seek out educational and training opportunities. These activities build awareness and deliver specific resources and strategies social workers need.

Build Expertise in Collaborative Social Work

Interdisciplinary collaboration in social work empowers teams of professionals striving to create more socially just and healthy communities. These partnerships expand social workers’ knowledge and resources and better position them to make a meaningful difference.

Explore how Virginia Commonwealth University’s  online Master of Social Work  gives social workers the tools to build lasting partnerships that advance social work practice.

From M.S.W. to LCSW: Understanding Your Career Path as a Social Worker

Kimberly Compton: The Interdisciplinary Role of a Social Worker

Why Cultural Competence in Social Work Is a Vital Skill

Assisted, “A Social Worker’s Role in Home Care”

Council on Social Work Education, The Role of Social Work in Interprofessional Education

National Association of Social Workers, Read the Code of Ethics

Social Work Today , “Integrated Care Models That Work”

Social Work Today , “Professional Development and Interprofessional Practice — Social Workers Share With (and Learn From) Colleagues in Other Disciplines”

The New Social Worker , “Elevating Competence in Social Work”

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Interprofessional Collaboration in Social Work Practice

• Karin Crawford - University of Lincoln, UK
• Description

How can social workers be more effective in collaborative work? What are the skills, knowledge and values required for collaborative practice? How does collaborative social work practice impact on the experience of service-users and carers?

These questions are faced by social workers every day and interprofessional collaborative practice is high on the policy agenda for trainees and practitioners. Written primarily for social work students and practitioners, although having relevance across the wider range of stakeholders, this book explores the issues, benefits and challenges that interprofessional collaborative practice can raise. Chapter-by-chapter the book will encourage the reader to critically examine the political, legal, social and economic context of interprofessional practice. It also explores how social workers can work effectively and collaboratively with other professions while retaining their own values and identity.

Key features include:

- activities to illustrate the ways in which collaborative working can impact upon the experiences of service users, carers and practitioners;

- discussions looking at the different people and organisations with whom social workers might work in practice;

- examples of research and knowledge for practice;

- a glossary to act as a useful quick reference point for the reader;

- a companion website.

Engaging and well-written, each chapter also includes case studies, reflective questions and links to further reading and sources of information. Interprofessional Collaboration in Social Work Practice will be essential reading for social work qualifying students and for practitioners.

Supplements

'This excellent, accessible and well organised book will be invaluable to all students of social work. A range of activities, case studies and examples which will be useful in undergraduate and postgraduate training are included. Interprofessional Collaboration in Social Work Practice offers a new insight on the profession.' - Fran Fuller, Senior Lecturer in Social Work, University of Derby

'Engaging and readable, Karin Crawford has done a fine job in constructing this book as a learning tool.' - Mark Lymbery, Associate Professor of Social Work, University of Nottingham

'For someone beginning to engage in collaboration and considering how to be collaborative in their practice, this book introduces some foundational and valuable considerations. For those of us with more reading and experience it is a good reminder of what we can do to make collaborative relationships effective for communities and families.'

We wanted to make our interprofessional modules less hospital focused and support a social care focus too.

Used on a course for professional social workers who work in adult safeguarding, the book gives a good overview on the benefits of collaborating with both professionals, carers and services users, a vital theme in this postgraduate programme.

This book discusses the historical context of collaborative practice and also looks at Social Work's contribution to it. It considers the implications of working with a number of different disciplines and the impact on the individual professional. A very helpful book, particularly for students on the degree course.

Some good links between theory and practice. Chapter 5 I am going to recond for all my students to read.

An excellent resource for students studying modules around multi agency/ multi professional working..

Interprofessional working is fundamental to all courses and it is valuable to understand the impact of social work professionals within the context of healthcare provision. Easily readable text with reflective triggers

Includes a good chapter on theoretical frameworks to support the understanding of interrelationships between professionals. Also, some useful exercises about professional identity.

A useful addition to texts in this increasingly important area of social work. Activities and reflective practice questions are helpful to students, the glossary is helpful too.

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SP2 ranked #8 among Schools for Social Work by U.S News & World Report

Authored by: Juliana Rosati

Photography by: Krista Patton

Faculty & Research

Penn’s School of Social Policy & Practice (SP2) has been named #8 among Schools for Social Work in the 2024 U.S. News & World Report Best Graduate Schools rankings . This marks SP2’s highest ranking ever, and the second time that the School has appeared in the list’s top 10.

U.S. News periodically ranks programs in the sciences, social sciences and humanities, health, and many other fields, based solely on academic experts’ ratings. The Best Schools for Social Work category is part of the U.S. News Best Health Schools ranking.

 “At SP2, we prepare the next generation of social change agents to embrace the highest standards of research and practice, and to apply their knowledge and partnership where they are needed most in the world,” said SP2 Dean Sara “Sally” Bachman, PhD .  “Within our unique, interdisciplinary school, students in social work programs learn alongside future policy makers and nonprofit leaders from our world-class faculty, in the setting of an urban, Ivy League university. We are proud that our commitment to a transformative education has resulted in a rise in the school of social work rankings.”

Dedicated to the passionate pursuit of social innovation, impact, and justice, SP2 offers five top-ranked, highly respected degree programs: Master of Social Work , Doctorate in Clinical Social Work , PhD in Social Welfare , Master of Science in Nonprofit Leadership , and Master of Science in Social Policy (MSSP) . For students interested in enhancing their MSSP with a certificate in data analytics, SP2 also offers the MSSP Program + Data Analytics for Social Policy Certificate .

SP2’s transdisciplinary centers and initiatives yield innovative ideas and better ways to shape policy and service delivery in a number of research areas: children, women, and family well-being; climate inequality; data-driven policy analysis and evidence-based practice; economic security; health equity, mental health, and aging; identity, immigration, and racism; mass incarceration, homelessness, and substance use; and social innovation, philanthropy, and nonprofit management.

SP2 also offers a range of certificate programs and dual degrees and engages in many collaborations with Penn’s eleven other schools.

Sara S. Bachman, PhD

office: 215.898.5512

fax: 215.573.2099

deansoffice@sp2.upenn.edu

2023 – Ronald B. Mincy, How Fathers Help Their Children Develop

Ronald B. Mincy is the Maurice V. Russell Professor of Social Policy and Social Work Practice, and director of the Center for Research on Fathers, Children, and Family Well-Being at Columbia University. He is a co-principal investigator of the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study, and a faculty member of the Columbia Population Research Center.

Prior to joining the faculty at Columbia in 2001, Mincy served as a senior program officer at the Ford Foundation and worked on issues including improving U.S. social welfare policies for low-income fathers, especially child support and workforce development. He also served on the Clinton Administration’s Welfare Reform Task Force.

Mincy is the author of numerous journal articles and book chapters, and is the editor of Black Males Left Behind (The Urban Institute Press, 2006). In 2009, he received the Raymond Vernon Memorial Prize for Best Research Article in the Journal of Policy Analysis and Management. Mincy is an advisory board member for the National Poverty Center at the University of Michigan, the Technical Work Group for the Office of Policy Research and Evaluation, the Transition to Fatherhood project at Cornell University, the National Fatherhood Leaders Group, the Longitudinal Evaluation of the Harlem Children’s Zone, and The Economic Mobility Project of the Pew Charitable Trusts.

Mincy is a former member of the National Institute of Child and Human Development council, the Policy Council, and the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management. He served as co-chair of the Grantmakers Income Security Taskforce and as a board member of the Grantmakers for Children, Youth, and Families. Dr. Mincy holds an AB from Harvard College and a PhD from MIT. He and his wife Flona Mincy have been married nearly 50 years and have two sons.

Leadership Talk: We Are the Leaders We Have Been Looking For

Edith Abbott Hall, Lobby

969 E. 60th Street,

Chicago, IL 60637 

Join the Crown Family School of Social Work, Policy, and Practice in a spring Leadership Talk where you can explore our new Social Sector Leadership (SSL) and Non-Profit Management program while engaging in a compelling conversation with one of the nation’s preeminent scholars and a New York Times bestselling author, Eddie S. Glaude Jr., PhD, who is the James S. McDonnell Distinguished University Professor of African American Studies at Princeton University. This Leadership Talk is in collaboration with the  Family Action Network (FAN).

In his new book, " We Are the Leaders We Have Been Looking For ," Glaude makes the case that the hard work of becoming a better person should be a critical feature of Black politics. Through virtuoso interpretations of Martin Luther King, Jr., Malcolm X, and Ella Baker, Dr. Glaude will show how ordinary people have the capacity to be the heroes that our democracy so desperately requires, rather than outsourcing their needs to leaders who purportedly represent them.

The first 200  Attendees will receive a free, signed copy of the book, courtesy of FAN. 

This event is free* and welcomes participants from all backgrounds.  Attendance is open to all.

Professional Development Credit is available. This event satisfies 1.5 hours toward the cultural competence requirement for social workers.

*There is a fee for those attendees seeking Professional Development Credit

Keynote Speaker

Eddie S. Glaude, Jr., PhD , is the author of several books, including  Democracy in Black  and the  New York Times  bestseller  Begin Again: James Baldwin’s America and Its Urgent Lessons for Our Own , winner of the Harriet Beecher Stowe Book Prize. He frequently appears in the media as an  MSNBC  contributor on programs like  Morning Joe  and  Deadline: White House .

In his writing and speaking, Glaude is an American critic in the tradition of James Baldwin and Ralph Waldo Emerson, confronting history and bringing our nation’s complexities, vulnerabilities and hope into full view. Hope that is, in one of his favorite quotes from W.E.B. Du Bois, "not hopeless, but a bit unhopeful."

Moderator of Discussion

Lisa L. Moore , PhD, LICSW is Senior Lecturer and Director of the A.M. Program in Social Work, Social Policy and Social Administration at the Crown Family School of Social work, Policy, and Practice. She has extensive teaching, administrative, and clinical practice experience. Lisa has worked in higher education for over 25 years as an administrator and faculty member. In addition to her work in higher education, she has sustained a small private psychotherapy practice and consultation business  where she has done therapeutic work with individuals, families, and couples, and provided organizations reviews of equity and inclusion endeavors, consultative supervision, and facilitated high tension meetings between staff and senior management of non-profit organizations and educational institutions.  

Dr. Moore’s scholarship is broad and diverse. Ranging from work with Gullah-Geechee Families on St. Helena Island, SC to her current scholarship and instruction which is focused on addressing the work of Fanon’s ideas of phobogenesis to understand the construction of the fear

Welcome Remarks & Overview of Social Sector Leadership Program

Nicole P. Marwell is a Professor in the University of Chicago Crown Family School of Social Work, Policy, and Practice, where she is also Faculty Director of the School's Master's Degree in Social Sector Leadership and Nonprofit Management. Marwell is a faculty affiliate of the UChicago Department of Sociology, affiliated faculty at the UChicago Data Science Institute, and a member of the Faculty Advisory Council of the UChicago Mansueto Institute for Urban Innovation.

Marwell has published articles in the  American Sociological Review ,  American Journal of Sociology, Annual Review of Sociology, Annals of the American Association of Political and Social Sciences, City and Community ,  Social Service Review, Human Service Organizations, Qualitative Sociology , and the  Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly.  Her 2007 book,  Bargaining for Brooklyn: Community Organizations in the Entrepreneurial City  was published by the University of Chicago Press. Prior to beginning her academic career, Professor Marwell worked in the field of nonprofits and philanthropy, including at New York City’s Museum of Contemporary Hispanic Art, the AT&T Foundation, the Levi Strauss Foundation, and Nike.

She was previously an Associate Professor of Public Affairs at Baruch College, the Academic Director of the Baruch Center for Nonprofit Strategy and Management, and a member of the Sociology faculty at the CUNY Graduate Center.

Professor Marwell received her PhD in sociology from the University of Chicago.

Event Sponsor is Family Action Network (FAN)

Attendees will receive a free, signed copy of the book, courtesy of FAN.

If you have any questions about access or to request a reasonable accommodation that will facilitate your full participation in this event such as ASL interpreting, captioned videos, Braille or electronic text, food options for individuals with dietary restrictions, etc. please contact the event organizer.

Upcoming Events

Apr 22 Book Talk: Grow and Hide: The History of America's Health Care State Apr 22, 2024 5:00pm (CDT) Learn more

May 9 An Introduction to the Use of Psychedelics in Mental Health Treatment May 09, 2024 9:00am (CDT) More about the event

May 16 Harnessing the Healing Power of Nature in Play and Expressive Therapy May 16, 2024 9:00am (CDT) More about the event