Rehabilitation for the Unwanted: Patients and Their Caretakers

by Eddy,Elizabeth

• ISBN13: 9780202363523
• ISBN10: 020236352X
• eBook ISBN(s): 9781351494014
• Edition: Reprint
• Format: Nonspecific Binding
• Copyright: 2010-05-15
• Publisher: Routledge
• More Book Details

Summary

This book is a study detailing what happens to people and what life is like in a rehabilitation program. The program discussed is embedded in an institution, called "Farewell Hospital" by the authors, that was designed to fill a demand for facilities for those judged unable to live on their own. Due to physical or mental handicaps and no family, friends, or other social agents who are willing to make a home for them outside of a public institution, these patients were placed in a rehabilitation unit.Most patients were placed with the rehabilitation unit as a brief interlude before their permanent placement in the custodial unit of the vast institution where they would live out their lives. This work deals with the question of what happens to patients once they are rehabilitated and the non-therapeutic rules and practices of the health and welfare structure of which they are a part. In this case, the rehabilitation specialists and ward workers set themselves the task of improving the life chances of their clients by treating their ailments when possible and by improving their physical functioning so that they were better able to care for their own needs.The authors examine the effects of the organizational relationships on rehabilitation outcomes and on the lives of the people who make hospitals their home. The text attempts to sustain feeling for the historical context of their study the "problem" of larger numbers of disabled, poverty-stricken persons, who are no longer wanted by anyone and asserts that a "solution" must be found.

Author Biography

Julius A. Roth (1924-2002) was professor emeritus of sociology at the University of California, Davis. He is the author of numerous scholarly articles and books, including Research in the Sociology of Health Care and Timetables: Structuring the Passage of Time in Hospital Treatment and Other Careers.
Elizabeth M. Eddy is professor emerita of anthropology at the University of Florida. She is the author of numerous scholarly articles and books, including Applied Anthropology in America and Walk the White Line: A Profile of Urban Education.

Table of Contents

Preface	p. ix
The end of the road	p. 1
Background to rehab	p. 3
The rehab team	p. 5
The clients	p. 6
The rehab clientele and its selection	p. 9
Selection for rehabilitation	p. 10
Other routes to rehab	p. 13
Patient participation in selection	p. 14
Our study cases	p. 16
Society in miniature	p. 19
The daily round	p. 20
Patient groupings	p. 22
Territories	p. 22
Interaction Groups	p. 24
The Stars	p. 26
The Isolate End of the Range	p. 27
Sex and Activity Patterns	p. 28
The patient class system	p. 29
Reputation and Dress	p. 30
Reputation and Staff-Sponsored Activities	p. 32
Disability and the limitation of activity	p. 36
Patients and their caretakers	p. 41
The caretakers and the team	p. 43
The caretakers and their charges	p. 46
Caretakers and activities of daily living	p. 48
Shelter	p. 50
Feeding	p. 51
Dressing, Grooming, and Toilet Training	p. 53
The Role of the Wheelchair	p. 54
Control of the work load	p. 54
Who belongs on rehab?	p. 57
The team	p. 62
The medical model in action	p. 63
Division of labor: experienced and inexperienced	p. 68
Advantages and disadvantages of a nebulous role	p. 70
The Caseworker	p. 71
The Group Worker	p. 75
The Choice	p. 77
Therapeutic-custodial dilemma	p. 78
Life in slow motion-the therapeutic pace	p. 81
Rehab in small doses	p. 82
The waiting game	p. 84
Reducing the wait	p. 95
The chronic pace	p. 98
Inmate tacks: coming to terms with the system	p. 100
The patient as an institutional inmate	p. 101
Inmate tacks on rehab	p. 105
Escape	p. 105
Attack	p. 106
Home	p. 109
The Party Line	p. 110
Relationship of inmate tacks to patient interaction patterns	p. 115
Playing it cool	p. 117
Living in the cracks	p. 124
Making do	p. 125
Getting help	p. 129
Sources	p. 135
Places	p. 138
The stash	p. 140
Success in working the system	p. 141
Where do they go from rehab?	p. 144
Place of discharge	p. 145
Pardon	p. 147
Parole	p. 148
Degree of Custody	p. 148
Control of Time and Place of Discharge	p. 153
Life sentence	p. 156
The patient's choice	p. 159
The Family as Agent or Antagonist	p. 162
Money Talks	p. 166
Success and failure	p. 168
The elements of success	p. 169
How successful?	p. 174
Success and time on rehab	p. 176
Roads to success or failure	p. 180
The Ways of Success	p. 183
The Ways of Failure	p. 189
Institutions for the unwanted	p. 193
Data-collection	p. 211
Some disability and social characteristics of the sample group of sixty patients	p. 219
Characteristics of interaction group	p. 223
Selected references	p. 230
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