Case Study Interactive 1: Building a Team Jane is the case management coordinator for a large public teaching hospital. She is responsible for all case management and discharge planning for admitted...

Case Study Interactive 1: Building a Team

Jane is the case management coordinator for a large public teaching hospital. She is responsible for all case management and discharge planning for admitted patients and directs these activities through a number of case managers and social workers who are each assigned their own caseload. Case managers are responsible for coordinating the activities for a number of healthcare professionals include physicians, nurses, nutritionists, pharmacists and social workers. The workload for Jane’s staff has increased as the hospital has seen an increase in admissions from poor patients with multiple chronic conditions and social issues. Jane requested approval to hire additional staff, but the budget did not allow for it. Therefore, it soon became apparent that Jane needed to find more creative ways to utilize her current resources to get more accomplished with less.

Jane had observed that some of her case managers and social workers were not working well together, or at all, in some cases. Part of the problem is that case managers have been hired to replace staff with social work degrees, which has created tension and division between staff. The case managers also struggle with getting professionals from different disciplines to participate in case conferences or to update their care plans. Each discipline seems to think only about their contribution to the patient’s care and finishing their own charts quickly, with little regard for the impact on other care providers and the long-term impact on the patient’s plan of care.

What could Jane do to help her case managers better coordinate the work of these different professionals? How can she make better use of the resources she has so that more work can be accomplished with the limited budget? What underlying factors may be contributing to the tension between case managers and social workers and what theories would offer insight into a possible resolution?