Spring 2025 Issue

Editor’s Note: To Ease Your Mind
By Josh Hildebrand
Social Work Today
Vol. 25 No. 2 P. 4

Balance is essential to maintain all facets of life—social work is no exception. With long working hours and complex, emotional cases, social workers often neglect this balance in their personal lives in favor of supporting their clients. While their pursuits are noble, neglecting one’s personal needs often brings about a slew of problems, such as increased burnout and even turnover. Maintaining this balance is even more true as spring ushers in its longer, warmer days which can facilitate healing.

Keeping in line with this theme, this issue focuses on social worker well-being in a number of ways. One such way is described in the cover feature, in which Jamie Santa Cruz emphasizes social workers’ need to “keep the balance” in their lives. Whether establishing clear work boundaries or listening to their bodies, the work/life balance is crucial to ensuring social workers can continue providing quality care to a wide array of populations.

In his feature, Ron Zayas discusses maintaining social workers’ well-being through a different lens—their online presence. Oftentimes, social worker information is readily available online for those seeking it. This can allow malicious parties to gain access to sensitive, personal information relating to social workers and their families. There are actionable steps social workers can take to protect their information and uphold their peace of mind.

Navigating Medicare’s complexities is often extremely difficult for vulnerable populations, but social workers can help. Al Kushner explores this in depth in his feature “Bridging the Gaps.”

Finally, Ariella VanHara, LCSW-QS, discusses “ambiguous loss,” a form of grief that can arise after referring patients to a residential treatment center. This grief affects patients and families in profound ways, and social workers can support and guide both parties involved.

All that said, this issue has something for everyone, so enjoy it. Thanks for reading.

— Josh Hildebrand
jhildebrand@gvpub.com