UNIT 5: Meeting Individual Care and
Support Needs
Learning aim A: Examine principles, values and skills which underpin meeting the care and
support needs of individuals
Learning aim B: Examine the ethical issues involved when providing care and support to
meet individual needs.
Learning aim C: Investigate the principles behind enabling individuals with care and
support needs to overcome challenges.
,Introduction
This report aims to explore how anti-discriminatory practice has been achieved at Care
home agency on service user Rober and James. At care home agencies there are many
service users that require different medical needs, many researchers have suggested that
the concept of needs refer to Moslow. His concept is about individuals needs involves
physiological needs, safety needs which include security and protection, love and belonging
needs and feeling accepted, esteem need how individuals view themselves and self-
actualisation about fulfil their full potential. There are laws that protects individuals from
discrimination: the equality act 2010 and humans rights act. The equality act 2010 protects
people from discrimination in a workplace and in society. The law implies that nobody can
be discriminated against based on characteristics such as age, disability, race, religion, or
sexual orientation. The human rights act protects individuals from discrimination. This
means that an individual does not have to be treated or protected differently based on their
race, gender, disability, religion.
This report will be focused on examining principles, values and skills when meeting the care
and support needs of individuals, will look at the ethical issues involved when providing care
and support to meet individual needs, investigate principles behind enabling individuals
with care and support needs to overcome challenges.
,P1- Explain the importance of promoting equality and diversity for individuals with
different needs.
In a health and social care setting equality means that everyone has to be treated the same.
This includes having access to services they need, no matter where they live or based on
their characteristics, where they come from or if they have a disability. For example,
everyone has to register with a doctor. Diversity is about appreciating and valuing
everyone's differences including religion, beliefs, culture. It is important to take time to
understand different cultures to meet individual needs and it is a legal requirement for
health and social care organisations to value and respect individual beliefs. For example,
Britain is known as a multicultural society, and it had an impact in the healthcare setting.
The benefits of working in a multicultural society is that new opportunities are available
such as it allows professionals to learn new treatments and different ways you can deliver
social care. It is important to acknowledge equality and diversity as an individual can only
eat certain foods due to its religion. If this was not taken into consideration, then they
would feel unvalued.
Robert can be considered being diverse because of his spiritual needs, medical needs due to
his history of epilepsy and stroke, mobility issues as he requires to use a wheelchair when
outside, need to use a frame, speech difficulties and because he is transgender. Jim can be
treated due to his religion, his health as he has heart failure, renal failure, hypertension,
suffers from water retention due to his kidney failure, uses a frame or uses a stick to walk.
As a result, Robert and Jim will not be equally based on their characteristics and needs.
Equality and diversity are important for Jim and Robert so that they can receive treatment
for their medical condition.
Under the equality act 2010 it protects groups of age, gender, disability, marriage and civil
partnership, pregnancy or maternity, race, religion or belief, sex and sexual orientation. If
private, public or voluntary organisations treat people differently based on these
characteristics then it means that they are breaking the law. If an individual feels that they
are being discriminated against then they can complain to the organisations and actions will
be taken. If they do not take any action, then they take the case up to court and get a
lawyer. The act also allows Positive Action which is about organisations providing additional
benefits if support is needed. By providing Positive Action it will reduce the impact of
disadvantages.
If equality and diversity is not promoted, then discrimination can happen and there are four
ways discrimination can happen. Unfair discrimination is when you are being treated
differently based on your characteristics such as ethnicity, age, gender. Examples of unfair
discrimination is when a healthcare organisation refuse to provide you with service by not
, taking you as their patient, when healthcare organisation decides to stop providing patient
with a service. Direct discrimination is when a healthcare professional is treating you
differently or worse than another person by being rude or offensive. For example, when a
woman is not offered a promotion despite her high qualification and work experience
because of the fact she is a woman and that she is being identified as weak and maybe not
capable of doing the job correctly and therefore the promotion will be offered to a less
qualified man. Indirect discrimination is when an healthcare professional has a policy that
applies to all patient but has a worse effect on some people than others based on their
characteristic. It can be hard to identify indirect discrimination as they will not be many
proofs or someone to testify.
For example, when a person wants to register with the GP surgery, they will ask for an
address. But an Irish person is less likely to give an address as the person does not live in the
UK. Positive discrimination is when a professional favouritism another person based on the
characteristic. An example of this is when a professional recruit an individual based on their
characteristic rather to take the person with the candidate role. There are other types of
discrimination such as victimisation, discrimination by perception and harassment.
Victimisation is when a person treats you badly because you complain about discrimination.
Discrimination by perception is when a person is being treated unfairly as they believe to
have protected characteristic. An example of it is when a member of staff does not want to
supervise a student as they believe she or he is transgender. Harassment involves
threatening comments, abusive, violence or stalking. Antilocution when someone speaks
against someone.
Jim and Robert can be discriminated against due to their medical condition. Robert has
epilepsy and has suffered from a stroke. Professionals can decide to not to treat him. People
can treat him differently as he can seem weak and fragile and because he regularly needs to
take medication. In addition, people can see his medical condition as a disability because
when someone suffered of stroke sometimes can lead to paralysis and because he need to
take his medication regularly he can be seen as someone that needs to be looked after and
due to his history with epilepsy and stroke he will need to regularly go to the hospital for
check-up and to receive his treatment. This can lead to Robert having a low self-esteem, loss
of confidence as he is being treated differently, depression and social isolation. He can be
discriminated against because he needs support with independent living as he can get
judged by others, seem fragile or people can laugh at him as he needs a care worker to help
him with daily tasks and personal care. Another reason why Robert may get discriminated
against is because he is transvestite. For example, maybe a healthcare setting will refuse
him medical care access as he is being judged. This can lead to Robert being depressed and
having low self-esteem but more importantly Robert may want to change the way he
dresses or change what he likes so that he will not be harassed or so that he will not feel
embarrassed. This could lead Robert in being vigilant when going out and can result in stress
or anxiety or social isolation. Robert can have a sense of not belonging and to not feel
