Social problems of women patients in a private obstetrics and gynecology clinic

Patients present or exhibit problems other than physical ones to their physicians and need access to some type of assistance for them. Over a 1 year period, women patients were referred to and seen by the medical social worker employed by a private obstetrics and gynecology clinic. Their social problems were studied by content analysis of patients‘ records, patients' social services cards, and monthly social services summaries. Results showed that 163 women exhibited 288 social problems consisting of three major types, financial, marital, and emotional. Various relationships were shown between the type of social problem and the primary reason the patient visited the clinic. It was also shown that if a patient has a financial problem, she is more likely to have a greater number of social problems than are other patients.