Engineering

Statistics

Social psychology

Public relations

Archaeology

Energy (signal processing)

Computer science

Business

Enthusiasm

Mechanical engineering

Psychology

Mathematics

Political science

Work (physics)

Geometry

Closure (psychology)

Point (geometry)

Plan (archaeology)

History

Developing practice

The beginning of the case management cycle, with tasks, goal setting, and hypothesising is usually full of professional energy. This phase is not only about engaging clients, but also engages us as workers. Clients in crisis are interesting, they need us, and they are even 'exciting' professionally (Dubowitz, 2007). We get enthused in assessing the issues and determining a plan. Then, the hard work begins. While there are some wins, often there are also setbacks. New issues emerge and we may realise clients have not been fully honest with us. We can start to lose enthusiasm and feel stuck. Quite often, it becomes clear that the issues are more entrenched, complex, and multi-layered than we initially realised. Motivation can wane. So, is it time to finish? Are we done? Some clients move away or stop engaging at this point. Others would happily see us, it seems, forever. While the decision to close is often welcomed by managers in a busy system where there are more cases to allocate, our motivations for closure can be varied, and there is little written about this part of the case management cycle.

Case closure: An under-examined part of the case management cycle