Social Policy and Humanity: The Use of Language as a Social Defence Against Anxiety

Abstract

Objective: People who work as social policy makers and as managers use a language that is different from people whose work is direct clinical care. The aim of this paper is to describe and explore this phenomenon in an attempt to understand that difference, why it may have developed and what we may learn from it.

Conclusion: This paper has at its heart the notion that the words we use (or don't use) are part of a system in which we attempt to contain our anxieties when faced with seemingly impossible health care issues. It suggests that by doing so we may unwittingly distance ourselves from people with whom we are working and in some way alter our capacity to heal divisions between and within conceptual and clinical frameworks.

“The polarising of financial imperatives on the one hand and clinical concerns on the other, is entirely dysfunctional in terms of ensuring optimal health outcome and maximum effectiveness and efficiency of use of the health dollar. The task is to bring the two disciplines of clinical care and financial management into accord. This, I believe, is the challenge of today's hospital management”. Stoelwinder 1997 1