Psychiatric Social Work Unit

Date established: 1968

Main Objective:

The aim of Psychiatric Social Work Unit is to enable people to manage the social factors in their lives like relationships, housing, and employment that allow them to get well and stay well by therapy, support, and advocacy

Services Offered:

 Assess patients and develop client’s specific social plans of care.

 Provide therapy/counseling for carers & family members to deal with client’s mental health problem.

 Interviews with admitted patients, members of their families, agency staff and others, and through collateral investigations.

 Help clients to get services and financial assistance from institutions and agencies like Police, Pension Department, Legal Aids, and other NGO and/or government organizations.

 Reviews resident and family social situations as necessary and modify social plan of care

 Provides direct crisis intervention services when required.

 Maintain case records and prepare social reports.

 Arrange the services from referral agencies to help patients send back to the community.

 Work as a member of multidisciplinary team in community mental health programmes

 Helps clients and their families to obtain financial, legal and medical services.

 Provide placement of clients in jobs, rehabilitation homes, and halfway homes at low cost or free of charge.

Highlights

 Intervening in the economic empowerment of 80 mental health service users by providing financial aid in collaboration with the Asia Foundation.

 Guiding and Supervising the Social under graduates from the national Institute of Social Development and various other institutions in their field placement

 Starting the NIC preparing programme for long-stay service users of NIMH and halfway

 Finding job opportunities for rehabilitated users in the corporate sector

 Organizing mental health promotion and education programme

Date established: 2008

Main Objective:

The aim of Halfway Home Mulleriyawa is to rehabilitate, empower and socially reintegrate female residents who have had long term institutionalized care due to mental illnesses complicated with poor family/relations support.

Services Offered:

 Improve quality of life and minimize their feeling of institutionalization by providing homely environment within the institution.

 Developing or redeveloping life-skills need for successful social reintegration via: o Training and improving Activities of Daily Living (ADLs) o Training and improving Instrumental Activities of Daily Living (IADLs). o Increasing life experiencing of clients by gradual exposure to society & social events. o Financially empowering the possible residents by incorporating them into income generating rehabilitation programmes (horticulture, handcraft, and sewing) or providing job opportunities to suitable residents (cleaner, domestic helper) o Providing necessary support for suitable residents to live in the society independently via Community Home Project.

 Reclaiming the lost civil rights of residents (provide National Identity Cards, Voting Rights)

 Legal support to settle their legal issues such as marriage & properties