Social Work Spotlight - Episode 1: Damien

Episode Date: April 18, 2020

In this episode, Damien and I talk about the importance of reflection in Social Work practice and his experience leading a multifunctional team to support people severely injured in motor vehicle accidents. We discuss clinical supervision and reflective practice and resources he draws on in the course of his work. We also touch on the positive moves within some government departments to bring new life, experience and enthusiasm to our roles and organisation culture, and how this can support him to develop creative solutions to address barriers for people with a disability.Links to resources mentioned in this week’s episode:NSW Department of Communities and Justice – made up of the former Departments of Family and Community Services (FACS) and Justice from July 2019. Until 2011 FACS was called the Department of Community Services (DoCS) - https://www.facs.nsw.gov.au/icare - https://www.icare.nsw.gov.au/National Disability Insurance Scheme - https://www.ndis.gov.au/United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities - https://www.un.org/development/desa/disabilities/convention-on-the-rights-of-persons-with-disabilities.htmlAustralian Human Rights Commission and the UNCRPD - https://www.humanrights.gov.au/our-work/disability-rights/united-nations-convention-rights-persons-disabilities-uncrpdUnited Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child - https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/crc.aspxAustralian Human Rights Commission and the UNCRC - https://www.humanrights.gov.au/our-work/education/what-are-childrens-rightsThis episode's transcript can be viewed here:https://drive.google.com/open?id=1nr84l3UQBDL8DvjmeEcPeqUSyJw2pe2nThanks to Kevin Macleod of incompetech.com for our theme music.

Hi and welcome to Social Work Spotlight where I showcase different areas of the profession each episode. I'm your host, Yasmin McKee Wright, and today's guest is Damien. Damien is passionate about living in a society that supports the most vulnerable individuals to exercise self-determination and have agency over their lives. He values reflective practice, supervision and ongoing professional development as tools to support his growth. He balances this with his sense of wonder of the world, his own meaning-making, narrative, and inner life journey. Damien left high school earlier than expected and ended up at university longer than he anticipated. He has trained in the fields of theology, social work and education.

His professional career began working with cars following motor vehicle accidents, and he now works with people who are severely injured following motor vehicle accidents. Repairing and finishing has become recovery and rehabilitation. It was an absolute pleasure interviewing Damien for this very first episode of the Social Work Spotlight podcast, and I hope you enjoy listening to Damien's personal and professional perspectives as much as I did. Well, Damien, thank you so much for agreeing to be interviewed. But maybe you can start by telling me what is it about social work that made you interested in this career. Okay. So, yeah, first happy to be a part of it. What made me think about social work, I like helping people. I feel a bit drawn to helping, supporting, caring,

others. And so social work, I just felt it's a good way to express that. And what did you study? Because I know you studied something before social work. I graduated from social work in 2008 from ACU and prior to that I'd done an undergrad in theology at ACU and and then in between those I was doing a grad dip ed in secondary education and working at a youth centre at the time and my supervisor said what don't you go and do the Bachelor of Social Work it was a two-year post-grade degree and put the education on hold. And I didn't really know what I was doing at the time.

So I said, yeah, good idea. And I did it. It just seemed right. Yeah, it was good. It was, I mean, I was going and doing practice with kids in school, secondary schools, and then going and working with young kids who were young adolescents who were at risk and they were really a different group of kids. Yeah.

And I felt much more drawn to the other kids. And what do you think led you to this point where you are right now in your career? Big question. Yeah. A few steps on the way. Short answer? Everything. But to break it down to some like smaller parts, I guess my,

experience of life itself so my lived the experience being brought up with my family their influence on me my friends my community everything that I've experienced that are sort of given shape to who I am my values my beliefs my hopes my dreams all of that combines together then yeah there's education There's maybe my sense of society. I want to make meaning of the world and then understand my place in it. So I think a combination of all that.

And then obviously my current roles in life, I don't have the same. You know, my family has changed, but now have my own family. I still have my other family, but I've got my own family. And with that comes responsibility, which I think as a young person, I didn't understand so well.

And I understand it differently now. And I think your progression has been a little bit unconventional in the sense that a lot of people go into, say, health first and then progress from there, they might work in community. But you've done quite a lot of roles that don't necessarily come under the banner of social work. They're a bit unconventional. Yeah, look, unconventional might sum me out as a whole. Yeah. I never really had an interest in health. Perhaps that's just my frame of reference, though.

You know, my first interaction with social work was receiving social work intervention as a young person you know I had the need for that and I had the experience of it but then I didn't really want to go into I didn't say it connected to health maybe that's why is my early experience of it so I tried to avoid any placements in hospitals and and but I did request a specific one in palliative care at Sacred Heart, so that particular hospital with their particular group of people. And that I enjoyed, but I sort of saw that removes from health as well. And the irony is now that I regularly go into hospitals as part of my work.

Sure. I think your perception of what health, social work might have been, had a lot to do with your supervisor at the time. Yeah. In that there's a very different role in palliative care than there is to most. acute health settings. Yeah. Yeah, I think the influence of supervisors in being able to open you up is probably critical. Sure. Yeah, critical part of it. So now in your current role, what do you do and what would you say a typical day is like for you?

It's varied. So my current role is a team leader. It's what we call a multifunctional team. So You know the terminology multidisciplinary team might be used in health and in some community settings, but for us it's a number of different functions within the same team. So I have 10 people that report to me, oh sorry, nine people that report to me, 10 in total. And then there's four different roles that report to me. So each of them has their own way of working around the client. Together as a team we aim to do that together. So my daily role involves supervising each of them. As you can appreciate, everyone comes from a different background.

Largely a lot of people come from different disciplines as well, a lot of allied health backgrounds. But my role will also include we work with people who are severely injured in motor vehicle accidents. So I have a bit of an intake role at the start, supporting people. people with applications and then supporting those people who are eligible to be matched up with a team member so it's a little bit of intake where I need to apply some skills and hope for the best about setting up a relationship for someone

who's you know going through a fairly traumatic period to link them up with someone in my team but that's a very early stage of the process and then We have people that are here for life. So largely that's each one that I, every one that I supervise largely has a caseload and all of their clients there at various levels of independence and so need different amounts of support and have different issues. So it's really supporting them in their everyday work about how they support their clients. engaging with stakeholders so it's treating hospitals insurers things like that so

that's one part of my role as a team leader really to support the team another way to support the team is that you know I want them to do the best in their roles and there's got demands asked of them from from their employer so it's about identifying ways and opportunities for them to exceed in their role it's not just joy of supporting someone sometimes getting the admin stuff done and the reports out on time and things ticked off so there is that there is that component of the role yeah and I guess I'm part of a leadership team for Western region and that is important because we need to really make decisions on how do we operate in our

region what's different from our region what do we need and how do we implement some of these processes that were or policies that were asked to implement and then how do we give feedback too about how could they be improved or tweaked and what do we need from the business in order to do that okay so a bit of a conduit role I see that is sure so I guess from an organizational perspective it's about understanding the system that you work in and getting a sense of how you function and how your team functions within that but also having a good understanding of the people that your team supporting as well as who your team members are as people and being able to match them accordingly

and then support them through that injured person's journey. Absolutely. Yeah, that sounds great. You mentioned admin and the joys that come with that. A lot of social work relies on being good with time management, but how do you personally organise your time? Yeah, look, planning and prioritising is key. I think record keeping and documenting file noting is very important.

And so I have to support others to do that at the same time. I think role model it. And so that requires some time for me to just put time aside. So I use my calendar. I'll block time out. I try and limit myself from being in a distracted environment because I can be distracted, you know, emails, piling, through. I think it's just really locking down in my in my calendar what I need to do.

And keeping small to do lists, but I guess the underlying features is my head might always constantly be, you need to do this, you need to do that, you need to do this. I guess the drivers are around that for me. What are the important dates here? So when I prioritize things, it might be what's important for that client and then what's important for that team member or what's important for myself and balancing that out. Because I guess you've got to factor in staff members taking leave and staff members who just might need time off for whatever reason because of the nature of the work. That's right. Yeah. So, I mean, you have to plan for the team. And the team don't always

understand your reasons for planning. But it's important, I think, to let them know. but at the end of the day you don't want to take too much work home with you all also so so I want to have my own life outside work but that's for me to choose if I want to knock a file note out at home we'll make sure that I've finished something I don't like making shortcuts so planning and prioritising make sure that I can get it done without having to shortcut it sure what would you say the biggest strength you bring to this role is um only one No, joking. I would say, yeah, look, passion, and hopefully compassion,

just to I really believe in what I do, and I believe in the existence of the agency that we work for, and then so the work that they carry out. What do you love most about your job? Oh look I really like supporting people but I like they can be with clients I like just knowing that you've made a difference to someone you don't I don't need the recognition for that the recognition is subtle and implicit it doesn't I probably feel odd or awkward with the explicit thanks

sometimes. But that's my own stuff. But I'm geared towards wanting to know that I've made that difference and I haven't taken a shortcut and whatever effort that I put in, the payoff is feeling that way, which is great. And do you think that's unique to this role or do you think that's something that you've seen in other roles as well? Yeah, I think no, no, this is evident in a lot of different places. Many different roles, I think, is it's available widely. It really is. And it sounds as though you'd probably bring those strengths and that willingness to help people, regardless of whether you did social work or not. But, I mean, it sounds like you found your way and you found something that fits for you. Yeah, I think social work, it's, you know, as a young person,

And, you know, I mean, when I started my career in motor vehicle accidents, I'm a spray painter by trade, and I still see myself as working in motor accidents now. But there's a long, there's a big chasm between and there's a long journey in between, you know. So for me, this is really, you know, it's just the way to give expression to what I value. And that experience on the way helps you develop professionally. Yeah, that's right. And get back to the people that support other people. Yeah. And what do you find the most challenging thing about your job?

Yeah, probably sometimes I need to practice letting go of stuff. Sometimes it's really around the organisational constraints or work practices of someone else and needing to allow that to just be and not to get too fuss over needing to change that or wanting to change that. So, you know, just, yeah, relaxing a bit. How do you relax? How do you decompress at the end of a long day or long week?

A glass of wine is helpful. Yep. But not two, just one. I garden. Yeah, I spend time in the garden at home. and I spend time with my family, so, you know, just socialising, talking with my life, with my kids, helping them with homework, playing in the backyard, whatever it be, just having, you know,

just genuine human interaction. I like to be quiet by myself too, though. I like to read, like to listen to music. One of the advantages of living quite a distance from work is I get a couple of of hours at least each day in the car and I find that quite helpful I just put on something to listen to and just go with the flow of the traffic so I don't really get involved in what's happening I just go with the flow yeah so it's a nice practice but yeah but I guess I value supervision so I see someone for

supervision and I think that's probably a critical way of just helping me unpack stuff and that generally has worked out to be on a Friday in the afternoon and I find that's a fantastic way to in the week yeah you know after a month it's just to let stuff out unpack it see what it is and then go home I was actually going to ask about that because in the field where you're working at the moment there isn't that emphasis on supervision that there might be in a health setting or in a community setting. So it can be hard to find that time or to force yourself, I guess, to go to supervision. But it sounds as though it's something you've developed over time is that skill and desire to

reflect. Yeah, look, I love reflecting and I need perspective too. And I feel that this just adds that kind of perspective. we, you know, it's a time and a space where we both know why I'm there, we both generally know what I need, I may be slower to come to that. But I've got the answers, so at the same time, it doesn't take away from the supervision that I get here, but it's different, you know, that I guess I fund it myself, I pay for it myself for the reason that I actually see this is about me.

It's about my career, my professional growth. And so it's an investment for me, but it's something that I think sustains me and helps me to, you know, improve or develop in my own profession. And in terms of sustaining growth, what would a typical career trajectory look like in the insurance world? In the insurance world, I'm not sure because I,

typically don't see myself working in that space. So that's probably, you know, one area where trying to make sense of the world society, where do I work, how do I operate? I, yeah, look, the insurance world is quite big. I sort of break it down so I can understand it in functions. So as a kid, I hated insurers. because I thought it was a scam. I thought that, and it was that my dad had worked in insurance, and I thought it was a scam that big companies would pile amounts of money into their bank accounts from people by saying,

aren't you worried about this happening? You better give me some money for that. But now that I can sit back and go, that was the premium collecting side of things. And there is, you know, there's all this underwriting and policies. I don't really get all that. I don't understand that. It's just that my head doesn't work that way.

I could probably give it a shot and try and understand it, but I'm just not geared that way. But what does interest me is the function of the insurer to support people. And that's where I see this is actually a fantastic opportunity because you don't necessarily have resources that are sometimes limited. Many social workers are scratching themselves to try and, you know, tap into resources for clients and they're operating off an oily rag. You know, that's just, they're begging for funding from a government department

to operate in an area where they're struggling to get the resources together. It's not that there's unlimited resources here, but it's not the major factor with cost. It's really looking at it from a person perspective. Sure. Of what do they need? And, no, it's not to say that there's not a hope that that reduces costs for, you know,

overall by looking after someone properly. I get that. And the shareholders were everyday people involved so, you know, there's all that to take into account. But, yeah, ideologically, I struggle to think of the insurance world. What do you think would be progression for you? Where would you like to work after this? I still value the education side, like studying in education and, uh, I'm studying in education and And I guess now that my kids are entering into school, I'm reviewing education and school as a place of community and growth and something really quite important. So ultimately down the track, I would like to see an ability to maybe work towards a leadership role in a school. or like I'm Catholic, so maybe in the school's office or even maybe something connected with

one of the functions of the local church. So no, it doesn't have to be a hospital, but it could be any kind of education setting or welfare setting, something like that. Do you think if time or money were not an option, that would be, would you be interested in maybe studying education going back there? Yeah, look, I'd love to. study more my wife's studying at the moment though so it's her turn yeah fair enough something's got to give yeah to operate a household with um and i've done i've done my fair share

so she's studying now when she's done um yeah i'll look to something what would be a career that you have no interest in yeah i was never one for child protection in that sense of um of working at docs or facts. Not to say that I haven't worked with kids who interact with child protection and not to say that I don't think that kids need protection. Yeah. But that, yeah, that's not something to that's for me. And in this particular field where you're working at the moment,

have you seen any particular changes in the time that you've been here, if it's about policy or maybe about the way that you do your job or the people that you support do their job? Yeah, there's been a huge change. It's, I guess it's tried to, the baseline motive for why people are engaged in this scheme and how people work remains the same. It really is that they're the most severely injured people.

They probably need lifelong support. So let's support them to reach their goals. and they're identified needs. So that remains the same. The way that we're going about that really has broadened and it's been boosted, you know, over the last few years. So where we were once a small agency on our own, in a small cluster of government agencies,

we're now part of a bigger hole. And that bigger hole has come with, a lot more enthusiasm around new policies and new processes they're geared at formalising things that were maybe informal before putting in a lot of you know it's professional I don't want to use the word as professionalised it to say that it was unprofessional before certainly wasn't but it's professionalising it to a point of it's changing it from a government department you know it's it's enriching it, I think. So it's not a negative, it's a, not to say that government departments are

negative either, but sometimes they can be a bit bland. So I think it's enriching it with an energy from people that have worked in the private sector, modelling off opportunities in the private sector to really create an organisation that's fit for purpose for, you know, to operate in today's world. So closer to where perhaps we should be. Absolutely. Where do you think the next five or ten years might take us in this area? I think technology is going to be a big driver.

So technology in the sense of how we work and technology for how we can support people as well. I think they're going to be big drivers. Can you think of an example? Just today we were talking about a young girl who's so severely disabled, at least physically, that she can't get to school and they basically going to need patient transport to get her a kilometer from her home to school because the wheelchair is not suitable for her physically anymore the vehicle that's modified to family vehicle is not suitable anymore so it's going to cost about $900 a day to get patient transport to get her a K down the road

to school so she can interact with her with her peers and then they have to hang around so because issues with the commode and toileting so she has to go home and do that so you get a few hours at school per day for around 900 or something dollars in transport and just sort of re-viewing how could that be and because I know there are a lot of AI technologies coming about and being able to have someone in a space without actually being in the space. And that's, yeah, so that's the opportunity here, is to see how could that play out with this young girl, who, and I guess, you know, you have to look at it,

it wouldn't be the perfect option for always, but if it's for a period of time, how could we make it work? And it's trying to work with the family and work with the school because she's a vital component of that class. So, you know, not only is it important for her education experience, to be in a classroom interacting with others. It's important for those others in the classroom, for their experience to have her interacting with them.

So yeah, we want to be as cost-effective as possible or maximize her opportunity and her experience. But there's ways that technology can enhance that, and we can think outside the box and maybe do things that we haven't done before. And I think those opportunities will only increase. Sure. Do you sometimes wish you could be a bit more hands-on?

Do you miss that? step back that disconnect between yourself and the clients? I do and don't, yes. So I do miss it because I'm human. And so I have to be very aware of that and acknowledge that. From usually the first or second visit, at least the first visit, I'm telling them that I'm only here for a short time. So I'm constantly telling them that I'm phasing out.

Yeah. And it's really around markers about where will they be in their journey as to when I will phase out and someone else will take over. I'm not saying that's not hard. And I guess there's no, I've actually been trying to work on some kind of a checklist as to when's the right time for each person. But everyone's different. But this is something that I've talked about in supervision.

and this is something I need to talk about in supervision because I need to work out what's about me and what's about the client, what's for the team, and how do I do it best? So I don't want to hang on to a client because I kind of like working with them. Yeah.

That's not really fair to them. And you don't want to push someone through the system faster than is good for them. Yeah, and I may, you know what, I may not like someone. I don't know what I want to say, oh, okay, don't want to see you again. Yeah.

hand you over to someone generally I like them yeah yeah but but yeah you just have to be mindful of why are you doing that I know a lot of social work is sitting with that discomfort just feeling as though you are benefiting something somewhere even if it's not obvious yeah I think um sometimes what I find here is sometimes down the track you might hear four or five years later that you made a difference for someone. And because of the nature of the people, the client base here, that they're connected to this organisation for such a long period of time,

there's that benefit of the, you might plan to see, you know, in other roles, social work roles, you might see it germinate, but you might not see it bloom unless you're there for a bit and the client's engaged with the service for a bit. But here you might see that a few years later. And I guess it's nice to know that you had a part to play in that. That's what's nice. Do you think social work specifically might have more of an impact as time goes on in this role? I think this role is 100% suited to social workers.

I think, yeah, I think there's scope for our service delivery model to maybe be more inclusive of how we can have people from specific disciplines in here. and interact in different ways with people. So that, you know, I guess the way you try to look at some of this matching or allocations is that we try not to do it just on capacity. You can't just say this person's got capacity, that person doesn't have capacity, well, the one who's got capacity gets the referral. Yeah.

Because if they're not really suited or matched to that person, then perhaps that's not the best idea. So in saying that, not everyone is geared at supporting someone on a discharge, complex discharge from a brain injury unit. It might be you've got three or four people in your team who are really quite good at that and know how to work with families in that really early period. And so other people, their strengths or gifts lie elsewhere. And they might be really, really good at the community end and I think social workers have that ability to maybe step in in the early stage I think that's a good thing I wanted to ask about any projects or programs you're working on you mentioned the checklist are you able to tell me a little bit

more about oh look it's only um well your ideas at least and how you think it would make an impact it's only me just trying to translate my own experience into um um um you're not you're work so this is something that I've been working on and doing and sort of cross-checking and supervision here and there but it's not something that is widely done by others and I guess everyone operates as their their own but it's something that we've been doing now for a couple of years so now in my small group of two or three because my regional manager is part of the group too. Those conversations are going to happen more often.

And so the next part for me to contribute to the group is how do we use something like a checklist? But it's not saying that it'll be taken up. So if it's not taken up, that's fine. It's still for me though. Where are my measures against what I want to be achieving? So I guess that's a former social work research because you're testing something,

you're coming up with an idea, seeing if it works? I guess so, yeah. And the benefit of the research is that, you know, if you're seeing something works, then you can pitch it to others, and then they can test it more widely. And you can see, is it valuable or not? And if it adds value, then usually it will be taken up.

If it doesn't, it will be discarded, which is fine. But someone's got to have the idea to begin with. Yeah. Is there any part of what you do that you do, don't share with other people that's for whatever reason it might be too hard for them to either understand or to handle some very difficult things that happen in your work no I just think there's all a private conversation obviously confidential conversations that you you know you need to you need to describe

people sometimes and you need to describe their situation is in a bit of an objective way but subjectively how you see it or you understand it and And it's just what it is. But you might, you may never want that person to hear you saying that about them because of how they may receive or hear what you're saying. But it's not anything other than descriptive in order to help someone who's going to be working with them understand the situation. You know, I mean, I'll give you an example today.

I described someone this morning. I noticed that when I was describing them, one member of the team sort of popped their head up and just looked at me a little bit differently. And even though when I was describing, I had to go, oh, I wonder what's going on there. And so what I was describing was a young girl who's had an accident and spinal cord injury and she's had a long history of being fostered. And she's with her family, a very supportive family, five generations in the household. And she just presents her so timid and quiet and compliant and needy and almost bit anxious.

That when I spoke to her first on the phone she's 18 years old. When I first spoke to her, she sounded about 13 or 14. I met with her and a foster mum and the social worker and she presented just as if she did on the phone quite timid. just that when I she's transferred to another hospital regionally closer to where she lives and she was sent for an ultrasound just as I rocked up to see her which is to be expected but that you know you know initially you look at that as oh bugger you know really wanted to have my meeting at this time but I presented with an opportunity because the some of the treating team were able to have a conversation with them and

And they said, oh, you know, she really blew up at her Boston mom. That was from the character that I'd come to understand, it seemed really out of character. And she, her biological mother doesn't initiate any contact with her. And it's only driven by this young girl. And I'm trying to get a picture of who is this young girl, nearly injured with a spinal cord injury. It's going to change things as she moves around the community.

the equipment she needs, how she functions, stuff like that. And it was then the psychiatry review that was completed at the hospital. Just noted borderline personality traits. And for me, that was important to say, you need to really be careful around this as to now kind of understanding the presentation and emotionally does draw people in. And this might be part of this,

borderline personality which we just need to you can't demonize someone or stigmatize them or label them but that label helps me understand how to maybe interact with that person so that you're gonna need to be very clear and you're gonna need to be direct around things and maintain boundaries but you can I could see straight away how she would draw you in beyond your boundary and and it was just that when I said that to someone a team member looked up man so you you're kind of talking to the team and in my head I'm thinking I what do they think about how I'm saying it, did I say it the wrong way?

So God forbid if the client could hear me saying that. But you just want to, yeah. So I guess there's that sort of stuff that happens when you want to think you're still being nice. Yeah, and you feel the need to be really self-aware just to make sure that you're being appropriate and respectful. Yeah. But I guess that can be interpreted anyway. You can be talking about whatever and someone could, you know, not quite understand where you're coming from.

Yeah. But I guess it's about the conversation and opening that up and being transparent. Yeah, that's right. If someone were interested in knowing more about this field or in social work in this field, where would you point them? Is there any reading or viewing or things that you think

or any organisations? I would just go to the organisation's website, really. As a starter, I guess, you know, it's, I think NDIIS is a bit of a test case nationally for how people who have a disability need support and will be supported by government. And I think where we work proves that it's possible. So I think comparing the two is actually helpful, not to necessarily see the deficiencies in the NDIS, but to see the possibilities in it by seeing what happens here and how it can happen. Mind you, on a smaller scale for a longer time we've been established.

But, you know, other agencies who support people with disability, longstanding can do the same. We're in a time when things like there's basic articles of UN declaration. that need to remain current or need to be lived out. And so for me, it's actually going back to some of those, well, you would consider basic documents, but understand how is that implemented in a world that's really picking up speed. You know, there's a fast-paced change that happens.

And those ideas whilst maybe simple, they're actually quite profound their core ideas of not getting too much caught up in the fluff that they can come with the pace of change. So I guess things like the UN Convention on the Rights of People with Disabilities, that's a good place to start. Absolutely, yeah, rights of children, rights of all people, though. Maybe I can put some links for people to click on, just make it easier for them to find them, and then they can kind of go off on tangents

according to what takes their interest. I mean, exactly around the people with disability, you know, there's big movements around, you know, a social model of disability kicked stuff off many, many years ago and you can see where we're coming now to, where choice and control, coming into everyday language. But those core ideas have been there for a long time. Yeah. It's just taking so long to be able to implement them. Even if you don't go in to be working as a social worker, I think the education,

the perspective, the way of looking at things is I value it. I've been so happy to have you. Thank you so much for agreeing to be part of this. I look forward to hearing the future episodes. That's it for now. Thanks again, Damien. If you would like to continue this discussion or ask anything of either myself or Damien,

please visit our anchor page at anchor.fm slash social work spotlight. You can find us on Facebook at Social Work Spotlight. podcast or you can email SWSpotlightpodcast at gmail.com. I'd love to hear from you. Please let me know if there is a particular topic you'd like discussed or if you or another person you know would like to be featured on the show. And finally, a quick thank you to anchor.fm for hosting this podcast. Next week's guest is Dana, who works in a hospital rehabilitation setting

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