Harm reduction refers to policies, programs and practices that aim to reduce harms associated with drugs using. Harm reduction activities are focusing on the prevention of harm, rather than on the prevention of drug use itself. It is an approach that falls under the field of public health, professionals working in this field in Slovakia, however, are mainly students or graduates of social work. Social workers work with the clients in their natural environment-on the street. Street workers work with drug users and often with people working in the sex business, so with clients who are marginalized. It is a difficult job, which in the general population often has a negative connotation. The aim of the study was to explore how social workers perceive themselves as harm reduction workers. We particularly focused on whether their professional identity is formed by the profession of social work or rather by the harm reduction philosophy. Another part of our interest was social workers' motivation to work in this field of social work. Qualitative research strategy was used. Semi-structured interviews with harm reduction workers were conducted. The participants were working with drug users and sexworkers. All of the participants were graduated in social work, with at least a bachelor degree. Most of the Slovak street social workers from this field took part in this research. The data were analysed using the program Atlas.Ti. Findings describe how street social workers identify themselves, what they consider the core of their profession and how this differs from other social work fields.
The aim of our research was to determine the quality of life of men and women who are current drug users in terms of their own perception. We decided to focus on gender because it can also interfere with quality of life. In particular, we aimed to investigate the main dimensions of quality of life such as health, economic situation and social ties. We used a standardized questionnaire WHOQOL BREF. The fieldwork phase of the research was realized from September 2015-December 2015. We used a snowball sampling for collecting data. We investigated that all four domains (physical health, psychological, social relationships and the environment) were evaluated worse by women than men. Women showed in relation to the fair value population the highest standard deviation in the area of psychological domain and men in social relatioships domain. The highest deviation in the areas between men and women was in the physical area. The results showed that quality of life of drug users was dimished, but not as much as we expected in terms of knowledge that literature states. Key words: drug users, quality of life, health, social relationships and environment.The quality of life of people who inject drugs, is the central subject of this proceeding. It would seem that quality of life is abstract concept. The truth is that, in various forms, it is the subject of professional, non-professional, or political debates for a long time. According to Kucharova, the discussion regarding the quality of life already appeared in ancient and Eastern philosophy [1]. The issue has been discussed at the level of philosophical reflections. Many of them spilled over into the field of ethics. In ancient times, this phenomenon was called good life, well-being or social security. Such references to the quality of life can be found in the works of Aristotle, Aquinas, Socrates, Kant and others [2]. Their ideas provided the foundations for later determination of quality of life, respectively with related issues.The term "quality of life" in the literature began to appear more frequently in the 60s of the 20th century, when particularly was emphasized its economic dimension and the issue of standard of living. In the 70s, the issue was studied by many authors, but it was also studied from the perspective of various disciplines. Despite this diversity, all authors approvingly pointed out that it is necessary to focus on the area of the standard of living, quality of life and their interconnection [3]. Subjective assessment of quality of life people themselves was the subject of research but with regard to the objective conditions in which they live [2].
Migration is a phenomenon that is present in every country. Emigration is more typical for some countries and immigration for other countries. In the past, emigration was typical for our country.. Recently, however, more and more immigrants arrive in Slovakia, especially in terms of looking for work. The aim of this article was to explore how migrants perceived their integration process and the provision of social services in Slovakia. We particularly focused on what social services they used during their integration process, how did they assess the approach of the staff of the institutions that provided social services. The survey sample was composed from immigrants living in Slovakia for at least one year. We used a snowball technique to select the participants. The survey sample consisted of 25 people from different countries of origin. Qualitative research strategy was used. A semi-structured interview scheme was designed to obtain information about integration process and provided social services during integration process. The data were analysed using the program Atlas.Ti. Findings describe how immigrants perceive their integration process and how they perceive the provision of social services were mainly positive with a few of negative experiences. This paper was prepared as a part of the project VEGA 1/0341/17 Identification of Manifestation of Social Riskiness of Families in Selected Indicators and Their Impact on Social Functioning of Families.
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