Emerging roles of social work in perinatal services

Perinatal social work is a recent field of practice with expanding opportunities and responsibilities for social workers in direct practice, research and education. This paper discusses the emergence of high technology in the perinatal field and the specialization of social work knowledge, skills and roles which are developing in tandem with bio-medical advances. The need to reconcile compelling needs for preventive social work practice with those of specialization are examined.