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Essay Instructions: Due April 20
Single Subject Design Group Exercise
M. Thomas -- S-502

Names of Participants: ____________________, ______________________ and __________________.

In social work practice, we work with the client to develop a plan for our time together -- commonly referred to as a treatment plan. This gives focus to our work with the client and it gives us a sense of whether the client is improving. As you will see with this exercise, the treatment planning process and the development of a single subject design study are nearly indistinguishable.

Like the other exercises in this course, you will partner with 2 to 3 of your classmates. You will create a treatment plan and single subject design research study based on the following case scenario:

Jeff is a 45-year-old veteran of the first gulf war. He is divorced and has two children (Tiffany, age 12 and Jack, age 10). In 1992, he was injured during a training exercise in which he detonated a simulated grenade into what he thought was an empty room. To his surprise, the room had contained leaking tear gas canisters. The flash of the grenade caused the tear gas to release. Jeff had taken in a lungful of tear gas, temporarily blinding him and causing him to pass out. Following the incident, Jeff reported difficulty breathing. X-rays showed a great deal of scarring in his lungs. Within two months, Jeff was honorably discharged. Prior to the incident with the tear gas, Jeff had taken a fall while climbing a rope during a training exercise. The fall resulted in an injury to his shoulder and back.

Following his discharge from the service, Jeff was provided medical treatment. However, he reported difficulty managing the pain from his two injuries, and after several months, he began to obtain pain medication via illicit means. He is currently taking about 240mg of Oxycontin per day (therapeutic dosage for pain is 10mg to 20mg twice a day). Because Jeff spends about $100/day to purchase Oxycontin, Jeff has been involved in numerous thefts ? usually expensive lawn mowers from big box home improvement stores. In addition, he reported taking money from his girlfriend?s bank account without her knowledge. He stated that because they live together, he and his girlfriend should share resources. She is considering pressing charges against him.

In addition, Jeff has reported difficulty sleeping and reported memories that he has difficulty putting out of his mind. He stated that these memories are related to incidents of violence when he was growing up. In one incident, he stated that he observed his father striking his mother which caused her to have two black eyes. When the police arrived, his father also got into a physical altercation with police who subdued him through the use of their night sticks and repeatedly kicking his father when he was on the ground. Jeff reported feeling helpless to stop the altercation between his father and the police and still has feelings of guilt over the incident because he called the police. He was 12 years of age at the time.

Also, Jeff has had difficulty holding onto a job. Since leaving the army, he reported not being able to maintain continuous employment for longer than one year. Though Jeff admits that his life is a mess, he does not see his drug use as the primary problem.

In creating your treatment plan consider the following questions:
? What goals can you identify for Jeff? List two or more.
? How will he achieve these goals?
? What strengths does Jeff have that might help him reach his goals?
? How have you defined success? (How do you know when Jeff has reached his goals? How will this be measured?)
? When do you expect that he will have a particular goal completed?



Utilize the following format when creating your treatment plan:

Goal Objectives/Intervention
(Means of achieving goal) Strengths of client to facilitate goal completion Measurement of Goal Completion Completion Status




Now create a single subject design study based on the treatment plan created above. Answer the questions below and fill in the information in the table below.

What would your single system study look like?
? Which target behaviors might you focus on?
? How would you measure the target behavior?
? What research design would you choose?
? How might you create a baseline?
? How might you analyze the data gathered about the target behavior?


Goal/ Target Behavior Objectives/Intervention
(Means of achieving goal) Strengths of client to facilitate goal completion Measurement of Target Behavior Completion Status

Essay Instructions: The topic of the paper given to me was anything on the health care industry.
I chose prescription drugs and the effects on the U.S economy. I'm mainly interested in the negative side effects such as the soaring costs, big pharma marketing tactics and the widespread abuse that people forget only seem to associate with illegal drugs. For example there was recently an article and news story about how the makers of oxycontin who lied about the addictive properties of the drug oxycontin. One more problem is how drugs companies persuade doctors into prescribing their drugs by sending them gifts and free vacations. This in turn harms the unsuspecting consumer etc.