Death of social workers: trends from the last decade and recommendations for the future

This thesis will review incidents of social workers dying in connection with their jobs. Some of these incidents occurred while workers were on the clock and others occurred when workers were off duty but are connected to their job. This thesis looks back on the last decade, reviewing incidents from 2010 through 2019 in the United States of America. Four trends are identified within these incidents: (1) workers seeing clients alone, (2) clients having weapons, (3) workers facing a reasonable expectation of danger, and (4) workers being killed at their office or assigned work site. Suggestions for policy change are presented to address these trends, and a worker safety plan is presented that shows how policy changes can improve worker safety and helps workers identify actions they can take to keep themselves safe.