"If you want to become wealthy, do not be a social worker.

If you want to become rich by heart, be a social worker."

Introduction
As part of the course requirement at SW ELECTIVE: SOCIAL WORK CASE
MANAGEMENT, the 3rd year social work students must interview a social work case
manager currently engaged in direct practice. Upon saying that, this paper is a
summary that contains comprehensive information on the conducted interview of the
social work students, which aims to gather insights and information and explore the
social worker's profile and case management experiences in an agency. The interview
of the social work students started by reaching the interviewee through Facebook and
Messenger; asking her permission to be interviewed, sending a letter for formality, and
conducting an interview according to the set date of the interviewee. Furthermore, the
social work students' interest in the medical social work setting pursues them to
interview a medical social worker to explore and be acquainted with the social worker's
roles, functions, responsibilities, and competencies necessary to the medical field. This
paper aims to provide its reader(s) knowledge and information through its salient
features such as background and findings and reflection and analysis obtained by the
3rd year undersigned social work students, Dioniso, Anna Nerisa, and Lacay, Fatema
Mae of College of Social Sciences and philosophy of Bicol University through a
conducted virtual interview on the 27th day of October 2021 with ma'am Ma. Jessa
Larroza-Bosque, RSW, a social work case manager at Davao Oriental Provincial
Medical Center in Mati City, Davao Oriental. The interviewee was in her workplace;
therefore, the interview will pause when there is a client. The students understand the
situation, after all, clients first. The students encountered some setbacks, such as poor
internet connection due to rainy weather and power interruption. Nevertheless, it is
entirely worth it because of the interviewee's warmth and genuineness in imparting her
profound expertise to aspiring social work students.

Background and Findings

A social worker can practice their expertise and professionalism in a variety and
vast fields and settings. These fields and settings include but are not limited to the
current and emerging social welfare, education, administration, health, correction, and
community development programs and services. A social worker engaged in the field of
health, specifically in private or public hospitals, is called a “Medical Social Worker.”
They are expected to perform different functions, activities, and roles to help and
empower their client to solve their economic, social, psychological, and
medical/treatment problems and needs. For further knowledge and requisite information
about a medical social worker employed in a hospital, let us now explore the
professional experience of an adept and profound medical social worker/case manager,
Ma. Jessa Laroza-Bosque, RSW at Davao Oriental Provincial Medical Center
(DOPMC).
Ma. Jessa Laroza-Bosque, RSW is 31 years old female who graduated from Holy
Cross of Davao College in 2011 with a Bachelor of Science in Social Work and is now
taking a master's degree. She is a registered social worker currently working at Davao
Oriental Provincial Medical Center (DOPMC) in Mati City, Davao Oriental as a medical
social worker/case manager. She has been working in the agency for almost one year
and ten months. However, according to the ma'am Jessa, she has been practicing
social work for ten years now, and she is a member of the Philippine Association of
Social Workers Incorporated (PASWI). For ten years of practicing the social work
profession, she has multiple experiences in practicing the different social work methods
for working in different public and private agencies as a case manager and an assistant
owing to, after she graduates, she works as an office-based assistant of social workers
who handled the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program (4Ps) of Department of Social
Welfare and Development – NCR, region 11 for seven months and from being an
assistant she was promoted to another area of assignment. She works directly with the
community where she was accepted as a member of a tribe, a former caseworker of a
child in conflict with the Law (CICL), and experienced working as a medical social
worker in private and public hospitals. She shifted from a medical social worker in a
private hospital to a public hospital because fewer interactions happen and fewer clients
in a private hospital. According to ma'am Jessa, from her experiences in working in
different social work settings, the medical social worker is something she wanted to
practice because she has time with her family, especially with her son, and it is a trend;
the newly graduated social workers that she knows wanted to practice social work
profession in the medical field or hospital setting. However, suppose she will have an
opportunity to work again as a child's caseworker in conflict with the law, she would be
more than willing to grab the opportunity because she prefers working on case works. It
is more challenging for her to assist the child, from being assigned to her until the after-
care.
Davao Oriental Provincial Medical Center (DOPMC) employs ten (10) medical
social workers, and it is a small facility of a provincial government hospital in Davao
Oriental. However, because of the flourishing inaugurated advancements and
improvements in the hospital's facility, it is now acknowledged as one of the largest
hospitals in Davao Oriental that renders advanced and effective health services. The
hospital has 100-bed spaces for pediatrics and medicine ward, room for the medicine
department, emergency room, and nurses' stations. It also includes new technologies,
machines, equipment, and tools necessary for diagnosing and treating patients, from a
small facility to a bigger one and from a provincial hospital into a medical center. The
medical center is still in the adjustment phase. However, it can now cater clients from
different municipalities of Davao Oriental, such as Bayanga, Banay-banay, Boston,
Caraga, Cateel, Cupon, San Isidro, and Terragora, and one city, Davao City. The
Davao Oriental Provincial Medical Center (DOPMC) programs and services are
primarily health services. One (1) Malasakit Center, which started on September 26,
2019, Medical Assistance limited to hospital bills, outpatient department bills,
emergency room bills, and Maintenance Assistance. The Office of the President, Office
of the Senate, Congressman, Department of Social Welfare and Development, Local
Government Units, PhilHealth, Cooperatives, Senator Ronald "Bato" Dela Rosa, and
Senator Christopher Lawrence "Bong" Tesoro Go are the sponsors of its programs and
services.
Case management in Davao Oriental Provincial Medical Center may depend on
whether the case is normal or special of their clientele focus, such as the outpatients,
inpatients, and the patients in the emergency room. For the client with special cases
mainly but not limited to victims of violence against women and children, sexually
abused, and physically abused, the case management process:
1. Intake and Safety Assessment
 Information gathering through interviewing the client and its relative.
 Clients with special cases have limited interaction with the medical social
workers.

2. Hospital Intervention
 DOPMC provides assistance, referral of the clients to other agencies for further
interventions, and conducting counseling with the client for informing or
explaining to the clients why they will refer the client.
 Mostly, the special cases intervention was referral because of the limitations in
the Women and Children Protection Unit resources of the DOPMC. Other
services needed by the client can only be attained by referring them to the
agencies that will be met to provide the client’s needs. Other agencies can also
monitor, visit, and attend the hearings of the client.

3. Follow-up
  Medical social workers conduct follow-ups by sending letters to the social worker
assigned to the referred client.
 6 months monitoring and updating the social worker assigned to the case of the
referred client.
The case management process for clients with normal cases:
1. Intake and Safety Assessment

2. Hospital Intervention
 Provide assistance, including the no balance billing or counterpart billing to the
client’s hospital bills, emergency room bills, and outpatient department bills.
3. Termination
 Assistance needed by the clients is fully provided, hospitalization and medication
of the client is completed, and they may go home.
Davao Oriental Provincial Medical Center medical social workers used the MISS tool or
the Medical Social Services tool, Classification of the Client Tool, and Case summary.
MISS tool is a briefcase summary where all the gathered details or information about
the client, such as the client’s profile, classification, and financial capability, are
included. Classification of the Client Tool is a tool used to classify if the client is
financially capable or incapable according to the declared income of the client. Class A
is the client who is financially capable of providing the basic need of the family, and the
Classification one (1), two (2), and three (3) are the financially incapable clients. The
Classification D is the client that belongs to the poorest of the poor. Mostly, this
classification is qualified for the no-balance billing assistance. DOPMC classified two (2)
types of case summary. The retained copy of the case summary is the full information
and details of the client and the limited copy are the limited information, and details of
the client that will be used for the referral; limited information and details of the client
only because the agency where the client will be referred will also conduct a thorough
assessment.
The functions performed by the medical social worker of Davao Oriental
Provincial Medical Center depend on the four (4) offices such as Window 7, Window 8,
Outpatient Department, and Emergency Room, where they are rotationally assigned to
gain facets of the medical center. The social worker assigned in window seven (7) is
expected to process the bills of the inpatients who are ready to go home and prepare
the client’s documents and the client for referral to Malasakit center. In window 8, clients
who are experiencing issues in availing the services of PhilHealth are assisted and
facilitated by the assigned medical social worker in enrolling for their point of service or
also known as emergency PhilHealth. Medical social workers assigned in the Outpatient
Department performed interviews and assistance to the clients who did not need to be
admitted in their hospital bills such as ultrasound, laboratory, blood chem, and
computed tomography (CT) scan. They also facilitate outpatient check-ups and
vaccination for anti-rabies or anti-tetanus. Lastly, the social worker assigned in the
emergency room is expected to interview, assess, assist, instruct, and facilitate patients
who are not fully capable of paying their hospital bills to render them assistance.
However, the performance of the roles of a medical social worker is not restrained and
reliant on their assigned offices. They can always perform their simultaneous roles
every day in the medical center, such as resource provider, social broker/information
officer, enabler, facilitator, case manager, and counselor, as long as it is in their
expertise and competency. Social workers assigned in the differing four (4) offices in the
medical center experienced ethical dilemmas in their practice. The most prevalent
ethical dilemmas that they experienced are:
 Clients who use their connections to attain privileged treatment or services for
themselves,
 Clients who compare their attained services to different clients; and
 The aggressive behavior of the clients.
In addressing such ethical dilemmas, the medical social workers recognize and
understand that the client’s behavior results from their challenging situation. Hence, with
patience, genuiness, and courage, they will thoroughly explain to the client that they
understand them and to fully help and address their problems and needs, they also
need to adheres to the systematic process and the rules and regulation of the medical
center in availing the its services.
In these trying times, despite the fact that the Davao Oriental Provincial Medical
Center is still in the adjustment phase, medical social workers both deal with the ethical
dilemmas they are experiencing and the changes brought by COVID-19 in their context
case management. The most impactful change that occurred in the practice of case
management during the COVID-19 of the medical social worker is the limitations of the
services they can provide to the client's intervention because of the lack of resources,
specifically, funds and escalation of the client's need. Like in the assessment of a
particular client, she needs maintenance assistance for her husband, but the DOPMC
can no longer provide this service because the medicine was no longer available, and
the Department of Social Welfare and Development funds for the medicine was limited.
To cope with this change, the best thing that a medical social worker can do is refer the
client to other agencies where their needs and problems can be met and maintain the
system linkages of the DOPMC with other agencies.
A medical social worker working in a field of health ought to know a little of
everything, precisely should know about the basic standard and technical terms used in
the medical field and should be a jack-of-all-trades. It is a demanding and challenging
career. However, suppose it is something that you aspire to do. In that case, the
gratification you will receive from helping the client will bring various feelings of
satisfaction, learnings, and lighthearted experiences that will enable the medical social
worker to flourish professionally and personally.

Reflection and Analysis

Prepared by:

DIONISIO, ANNA NERISSA

LACAY, FATEMA MAE L.

BS Social Work