European Information Sources for Social Care

European Information Sources for Social Care

Julie Robinson

Project Information Officer

Social Care institute for Excellence

Overview

Brief definitions – social care and SCIE The European social care resource Problems searching social care information Some possible solutions Over to you - questions and comments

What is social care?

“People who have physical or psychological problems often require practical help coping with the everyday business of living. Social care workers provide this practical support.”

(Department of Health 2009).

Social care in numbers

2.8 million people in the UK receive some form of social care

1.5 million people work in social care Over 36,000 employers Bigger than the NHS

What is the Social Care Institute for Excellence?

Independent Charity set up by Department of Health in 2001

SCIE identifies and disseminates the knowledge base for good practice in all aspects of social care throughout the United Kingdom.

www.scie.org.uk

The European social care resource

Mind Map –clickable links to online information sources

Word document- describes and comments on the information sources listed in the mind map (plus URL)

Themes

Principal academic centres Organisations Databases Portals Key journals

Resources selected

Online Free English language Substantial Full text

Why searching social care literature can be challenging...

Diverse and widely spread over a range of databases

Grey or fugitive literature Language often vague and fast-changing US bias in the larger commercial databases

Good news- Social Care Online

Social Care Online

UK's most extensive free database of social care information

subject coverage -very wide ranging over 110,000 abstracted records Grey literature UK is the main focus, but does include

information on many countries, especially comparative studies, which include the UK.

Searching ideas

Dig deeper Consider high level overviews Think Nordic Use national library catalogues Consider searching on journal title(s)

Contact details

Julie Robinson

julie.robinson@scie.org.uk