LibGuides: Social Work, Social Care, and Community Studies: Practice and technical information

Social work and care practice databases

The databases below contains information related to social work and care practice.

Child Development & Adolescent Studies This link opens in a new window
Abstracting database covering the development of children and young people up to age 21, Child Development & Adolescent Studies includes journals, technical reports books and theses from biomedical and social sciences.
Community Care Inform Adult This link opens in a new window
From off-campus please select the Institution login
Community Care Inform Adults contains practice-related information for social work professionals working with vulnerable adults. This includes guidance to key pieces of legislation, articles and practice guides.
Community Care Inform Children This link opens in a new window
From off-campus please select the Institution login
Community Care Inform Children contains practice-related information for social work professionals working with vulnerable children. This includes guidance to key pieces of legislation, articles and practice guides.
Research in practice for adults This link opens in a new window
The first time you use this site, go to the Sign In link, then choose the Sign Up option at the bottom: please use your Sheffield Hallam email for the Sign Up form and create your own password
This resource brings together research and practitioner expertise to support evidence-informed practice. Professionals at all levels with benefit from a wide range of resources and learning material.
Research in practice for children This link opens in a new window
The first time you use this site, go to the Sign In link, then choose the Sign Up option at the bottom: please use your Sheffield Hallam email for the Sign Up form and create your own password
This resource brings together research and practitioner expertise to support evidence-informed practice. Professionals at all levels with benefit from a wide range of resources and learning material.

Legal Sources

UK Legislation This link opens in a new window
Comprehensive full text database of UK legislation from 1267 to the present. Managed by the National Archives
Public Bills before Parliament This link opens in a new window
This page provides links to the complete text of bills currently before Parliament listed in alphabetical order by title.
Details of the bill and debates connected to it are provided. When a bill is passed it becomes an Act, the text of which can then be found via the OPSI website.
Westlaw UK This link opens in a new window
Westlaw is an international database of full text primary resources including UK and EU legislation and case law, in addition to selected books and full-text journals.
You only need to create an account and login with it if you want to save searches on Westlaw.
Includes comprehensive coverage of English law reports and selected transcripts of unreported cases and a case citator.
It provides the full text of a wide range of UK law journals.
It also contains the full database of the Legal Journals Index, which is an index to approximately 400 UK law journals.
Lexis Plus This link opens in a new window
Lexis Plus (previously Lexis Library) contains a wide range of databases of full text legal resources, including statutes, statutory instruments and cases. It provides extensive coverage of English, U.S., Commonwealth and European Union primary and secondary materials. In addition, it provides access to journals and e-books.
Lexis Plus also gives access to information on the following practice areas: company and commercial; employment; family; financial services; litigation; personal injury; private client property; public sector; tax and accountancy, with many full text U.K. journals. Also included is a wide range of UK newspapers.

Maps and demographic data

Digimap Ordnance Survey Data Collection This link opens in a new window
Digimap allows you to produce and annotate a variety of custom maps, including Ordnance Survey maps.
Particularly useful is the Society view, which provides a quick and simple way to view census data for a chosen area.

Social Care Institute for Excellence: Strengths Based Approaches Resources

Strengths Based Approaches Resources from Social Care Institute for Excellence
Strengths-based (or asset-based) approaches focus on individuals’ strengths (including personal strengths and social and community networks) and not on their deficits. Strengths-based practice is holistic and multidisciplinary and works with the individual to promote their wellbeing. It is outcomes led and not services led. These resources describe how SBAs work in a variety of interventions and settings and provides information on how to enable and implement SBAs.
What is the Social Care Institute for Excellence?
You can find out more about the organisation and mission in the About section of their website.

NHS elearning for healthcare

Register for access to the elearning for healthcare platform at the link below, to explore a wide range of online programmes designed by NHS England to develop the health and care workforce.

Elearning for healthcare (ELFH) This link opens in a new window
To gain access to the elearning for healthcare platform as a student: You need to create an account using your student email address (ending in @shu.ac.uk). In the job role box, search ‘Student’ and select your course. You will need to enter Sheffield Hallam University as your place of work. University staff and students can sign up for full unrestricted access to the e-learning programmes in elfh.
The Elearning for healthcare is a platform provided by NHS England in partnership with other key healthcare organisations and professional bodies. They provide over 250 e-learning programmes to the healthcare workforce on a wide range of topics. This link takes users to the catalogue of e-learning programmes. https://portal.e-lfh.org.uk/Catalogue/Index

The elfh catalogue includes programmes on key topics related to social care including: Alcohol Dependence; Approved Mental Health Professional; Disability Matters; Loneliness & Social Isolation; Mental Capacity Act; Wellbeing & Mental Health; and Safeguarding. Completing a programme in elfh provides you with a certificate of completion to demonstrate your professional development.

NIHR Evidence

NIHR Evidence
NIHR Evidence select research studies funded by the National Institute for Health and Care Research that are likely to be of interest to the public and professionals and inform changes to policy or practice. They write up the findings in plain English and highlight the difference they could make.

NIHR Evidence provide:

Alerts – summaries of single NIHR research studies
Collections – summaries of several NIHR research studies within a specific theme or health and care topic

You can browse content related to particular conditions or issues, or search using the search bar and filters.

This resource should not be seen as a substitute for finding and reading primary research articles yourself, since it has a relatively small collection, does not allow you to build a search strategy, and will not contain the same level of detail as the original research articles. However, it can be useful for quickly getting a sense of some of the research in a particular health or social care area.

Social Work, Social Care, and Community Studies

Social work and care practice databases

Legal Sources

Maps and demographic data

Social Care Institute for Excellence: Strengths Based Approaches Resources

NHS elearning for healthcare

NIHR Evidence

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