Little is known about the role of hospital social work during end-of-life care of older patients diagnosed with dementia. In Australia, hospital social work assessment and intervention have been predominantly framed through systems theories, which provide limited insight into the dynamics shaping intervention outcomes. Using a complexity-informed theoretical approach, this article draws from a study examining end-of-life transitions for people with dementia in general medicine units. Expanding from a traditional systems perspective, we demonstrate the potential for social work to engage in situation sensitive problem-solving methods drawn from complexity theory to facilitate family adjustment following end-of-life transitions.

关于医院社会工作在被诊断患有痴呆症的老年患者的临终护理中的作用知之甚少。在澳大利亚，医院社会工作评估和干预主要是通过系统理论来构建的，这些理论对塑造干预结果的动力提供了有限的洞察力。本文采用基于复杂性的理论方法，借鉴了一项研究，该研究检查了普通医学单位中痴呆症患者的临终转变。从传统系统的角度扩展，我们展示了社会工作参与从复杂性理论中提取的情境敏感问题解决方法的潜力，以促进临终过渡后的家庭调整。