Widening the space of Social Work Initiatives through Psycho-social Interventions in enhancing Mental Healthcare Services

Social Work is concerned with the interaction between people and their social environment which affects the ability of people to accomplish their life tasks and realize their aspirations and values (Pincus andMinahan, 1978).The broad functions such as curative, preventive and promotive services provided by the social worker by playing innumerable roles such as, care giver, enabler, resource mobilizer, mediator, advocate, etc., Hence, social work act as a change agent in bringing out indispensable changes in the field of mental healthcare services and working towards addressing the problems which is the need of the hour. Case work process is used by the worker/ agencies to help the individuals to cope more effectively with their problems in social functioning by utilizing the client’s social environment.Social work develops the ability of establishing constructive relationship among the individuals through group activities. It also make efforts in meeting the felt and real needs of the community and develop the integration of the community. The practice of social welfare brings about and maintaining adjustments between social welfare resources in a geographical area or a functional field by providing the resources and requisite services for the needy. Social worker plays a pivotal role by helping the people directly and indirectly in overall planning, organizing, staffing, directing, reporting and budgeting.Social Wok Research on the other hand, in the field of mental health is preventive, promotive, and curative components of mental health.Both Qualitative and Quantitative research from social work point of view will generatea pathway for evidence based practices on effectiveness of in the field of Mental Healthcare services. To conclude, social work predominantly deals with the ‘person’ and ‘his environment’. Individual behaviour or problems are manifestation of his circumstances. In this paper, the authors throw light upon the inclinations and interventions of social work provisionseffectively in the field of psychiatric social workto address mental health problems at micro, mezzo, and macro levels. Key Words: Social Work, Mental Healthcare services, Psychiatric Social Work, Change Agent