Introduction

The 2019 introduction of social workers into general practitioner (GP) practice- based multi- disciplinary teams (MDTs) in Northern Ireland (see Chapter 4) has resulted in a range of initiatives that might be described as community social work (CSW), though that was not necessarily their expressed purpose. The sheer variety of these is a testament to the creativity of social work staff, and this can be seen in the booklet Social Work and Community Development (Northern Ireland Department of Health, 2023). These vary from the Garvagh Forest Families Project, which involved families with children in a summer programme based on basic outdoor experiences with nature, to a project that reached out to Ghanaian fishermen living on vessels at the very periphery of a coastal community. These will not be retold in this chapter, but the reader is urged to look at them as a fairly unique series of contemporary CSW examples.

Clarendon Medical Practice is situated in Derry/ Londonderry (hereinafter referred to as ‘Derry’) and, with eight GPs, offers health services to 12,000 patients across the city and its outskirts. It was among the first in the Western Trust to create an MDT in 2019 following the initial roll- out of the initiative referred to in Chapter 4. MDT staff appointed were a physiotherapist, mental health practitioner, social worker and social work assistant (there were plans initially for 2.4 whole- time equivalent social workers, but recruitment was paused for budget reasons). What is described in this chapter shows how a health setting with an inevitable focus on health rather than social issues offers wonderful possibilities for the development of CSW. Much of the success described is down to the creativity and enthusiasm of social worker Roisin Ferry, social work assistant Caroline Stack and their manager Charmaine McNally. This narrative benefits from the fact that some of their work has been externally evaluated from a health perspective by Ulster University researcher Dr Grainne McAnee in two phases: in 2021, when the Obesity pilot evaluation was published (McAnee et al, 2021); and in 2023, with the publication of Strengthened Connections (McAnee, 2023).