A qualitative study of front-line staff in the Irish Addiction Service

This work was the culmination of my four year BA(Hons) in Social Science college career in Dublin Business School. As a General Assistant within the Addiction Service, I felt that the role had never been explored and that there was no research pertaining directly to it. As front-line staff in Addiction Centres in the Dublin area, General Assistants are exposed to drug addiction in its rawest form. Adddiction Centres are tertiary referral centres for patients who are opiate dependant and many have other physical, psychological and social difficulties. Although service users are a vulnerable cohort, the difficulties which they experience are at times manifested in abusive, anti-social, and threatening behaviour. Invariably it is left to the General Assistants to ensure these incidents are safely resolved for all parties. This work sought to explore the relationships between General Assistants and service users, the impact the job has on staff's well being, the role itself within the multidisciplinary team, and any changes which could be implimented. This is the first piece of comprehensive research this author could find regarding this role and hopefully it will not be the last.