DSCN0522Scale for measuring functional efficiency was presented at the training held in Belgrade on October 14-15 2013 attended by representatives of the residential care institutions. The training was led by Mr. Miroslav Brkic, an expert on the project, the author of Scale.

Scale of funcional efficency (funcional efficeny is ability of person to independently fulfill basic needs among different aspects of a daily life), was developed in cooperation with service providers in the system of social protection. Based on this assessment’s instrument, needs assessment for users would be in place for residents in institutions and those who should be settled there.
Brkic said that unique Scale was not used in residential care institutions in Serbia until now but some of institutions have developed their own scales based on the assessment of users needs mainly in area of ​​everyday self-care. He added that the Scale was made for all user groups, because “scale refers to their operational efficiency.”

The scale can be used by all professionals working in the social welfare system, working in assessment and planning with users – in residential institutions, social welfare centers and other institutions and organizations.
The main objective of the scale is to improve reliability in estimating current functional efficiency and to provide adequate support to users in order to improve or maintain existing quality of life, depending on the present strengths and limitations. In such contexts, it is to contribute to the prevention of institutionalization and successful process of deinstitutionalization.

Support provided by the social institutions should maintain or improve person’s independence and help them to develop maximum possible quality of life. Failure to recognize need for support in the early stages and inadequate support without a clear framework for evaluating progress during development of functional efficiency, can lead to the early and long-lasting dependence of social system which will lead to a low quality of life of people and loads of social protection.

As part of training’s working group activities, participants were determining level of support required on examples from their own practice working with users.

The training was attended by over 60 representatives from the residential institutions involved in the Project (managers, social workers, educators, psychologists and defectologist) from Kragujevac, Jabuka, Kulina, Jelenac, Tutin, Stari Lec, Curug, Novi Becej, Stara Moravica, Veliki Popovac and Trbunje.