Swedish-language health and social services for families with children
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The goal of the assessment
The main question of the assessment was whether the City has promoted access to health and social services for Swedish-speaking families with children. This was assessed by examining whether the City has promoted the availability and competence of Swedish-speaking staff and developed Swedish-language services in accordance with its objectives. Whether Swedish-speaking families with children receive health and social services in their native language was also assessed. The assessment focused on maternity and child health clinics, school health care services, social guidance and home care for families with children, special services for families and some child welfare and family social work services. As a bilingual municipality, Helsinki must offer its residents the option of using the City’s services in either Finnish or Swedish, according to their own preference.
Conclusions
The City of Helsinki has, for the most part, promoted access to health and social services for Swedish-speaking families with children. The City has promoted the availability of Swedish-speaking staff through cooperation with Swedish-language educational institutions, among other means. The availability of Swedish-speaking staff has been poor in the past, but at the time of the assessment, the availability was good. As the availability of Swedish-speaking labour is lower than that of Finnish-speaking labour, Swedish-language services are more vulnerable. The City has developed its Swedish-language services primarily in accordance with its objectives. However, it is difficult to map the range and service network of Swedish-language services, as the service chain is not the same as that of Finnish-language services. In the majority of the services assessed, Swedish-speaking client families are provided with the same service as Finnish-speaking ones. Based on the assessment, the fact that some families are multilingual has become a challenge.
the Social Services, Health Care and Rescue Services Division must
- provide clients with an easy-to-find description of the service chain for Swedish-language social and health services for families with children.
- provide staff with a simple and clear description of Swedish-language social and health services for families with children for the purposes of service guidance.
- ensure that Apotti produces client documents in the language of the client’s choice, either Finnish or Swedish.
- ensure that employees’ language skills are recorded consistently in the information systems.
- apply the principle of a language supplement for employees in a uniform manner.
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