With Help After Storm, a Chance to Give Back
New York Times
Ms. Heintz and the staff — two psychiatrists, two psychologists and a clinical social worker for about 300 clients — are reaching out to the wives of the fishermen, holding focus groups to learn about their needs and teaching them breathing techniques and other coping mechanisms.

UC awarded contract for children’s mental health treatment
The News Record
The University of Cincinnati’s School of Social Work will soon be lending its expertise to Clermont County after being awarded a $1.1 million contract to evaluate a new mental health program in the county.

USC To Study Local Children Of Military Members
KGTV San Diego
According to USC’s School of Social Work, the program will monitor and address the social, academic and emotional challenges faced by children whose parents are deployed.

Column: Health care bill helps, but medical costs are still sickening
MLive.com
That dovetails with another recent survey, this one by the Association of Oncology Social Work. They found that two-thirds of cancer patients experienced financial hardships due to medical bills.

‘Top Ten Myths About Homosexuality’ Is a Huge Homophobic Fraud
Huffington Post
Ten Myths pushes the inaccuracy that a man who molests a boy is automatically gay even though the American Psychological Association, the National Association of Social Workers, the American Academy of Child Psychiatrists and the Child Welfare League of America, all say that the homosexuality and pedophilia are not linked.

Slaying of Citizen of the Year stuns Eastern Shore
The Virginian-Pilot
She received a degree in social work from Norfolk State University and her master’s from Ohio State University.  She was a board member of Eastern Shore Rural Health System and part owner of Therapeutic Intervention, where she worked with at-risk kids.

County Children & Youth ordered to provide info to social workers
York Daily Record
Jenna Mehnert, executive director of the state branch of the National Association of Social Workers, said Pennsylvania’s a bit lax when it comes to standards for social workers.

Social worker sees kids’ stress
Norwich Bulletin
Carolyn Trasko, a social worker in Preston who has spoken about families and stress, said children are reflecting an increased level of stress as their families struggle with issues such as financial problems.

EDITORIAL: Social worker could be influence
The Daily News Journal
With that partly in mind, Murfreesboro City Schools Director Linda Gilbert hired Tonya Hobbs last week as the system’s social worker to focus on the “whole child.”

New VA Rule to Help Vets with PTSD
New America Media
The rule change, which the New York Times reports could take affect as early as Monday, would eliminate the need of returning soldiers diagnosed with PTSD to document specific events, called stressors, in order to receive disability compensation.

House Calls For Elderly Could Relieve Squeezed ‘Sandwich Generation’
NPR
Older folks with lots of chronic illnesses aren’t the only ones who could benefit from a Medicare experiment funded through the new health law that will send doctors and nurse practitioners to visit them in their homes.

Vietnam Child-Abuse Case Exposes Lax Protection Services
TIME
In May, social work was officially recognized as a profession, a vital legal distinction in Vietnam’s communist society, in which nothing can happen without the central government’s assent.

Pressing for the passage of the Massachusetts Transgender Civil Rights Bill
Bay Windows
Rebekah Gewirtz of the National Association of Social Workers, Massachusetts Chapter, spoke after Springer. Gewirtz described the roll of social workers in the fight for transgender rights, explaining that social workers often work with transgender people, and they understand the difficulty that transgender people experience in their lives every day.

Photo courtesy of NASW Idaho chapter.

Cheers to NPR for this article on a study on the stress army wives experience when their mates are deployed and return home.

The article quotes National Association of Social Workers member Rene Robichaux, who is social work programs manager for the U.S. Army Medical Command. Robichaux talked about what social workers are doing to help families dealing with the added stress of repeated troop deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan.

For instance, the army is hiring dozens of new family and marriage therapists and is even offering counseling by telephone, Robichaux said.

To learn more about how social workers help veterans and their families visit NASW’s “Help Starts Here” Veterans Affairs Web page by clicking here.

A CNNMoney.com headline depicts social work and several related careers as “stressful jobs that pay badly.”  However, the actual article highlighted the dedication of social workers and how they provide valuable services to families and their communities. And back in August a CNN article advised readers to pursue a career in patient advocate social work because that line of work is expected to grow 24 percent. Photo of social worker Heather Griffith courtesy of CNNMoney.com.

Social Workers, what do you think?  Leave your comment and join the discussion below.