Following a recent conversation with a health and social care assessor, I discovered that some of her students are directly citing this website in their work.
Whilst I’m flattered that people deem my work worthy of quoting, I must advise against this.
Citations should be from sources that are authoritative and reliable. This could be the NHS, CQC, Skills for Care, the King’s Fund, peer-reviewed research papers or government departments.
Although I try to provide detailed and accurate information on this website to help students studying for health and social care qualifications, in the grand scheme of things I am just a guy on the Internet. I do work in health and social care (currently a team manager in a supported living setting) so I do have experience but I am not a professor in academia and do not have letters after my name!
Therefore, if you use me as a source, it is very likely that your assessor will advise you to remove it from your work.
This website should be used to gain knowledge and support you to understand what assessors are looking for in the answers that you provide. It is a great starting point and can help you to answer questions but if you require citations for your bibliography, it would be prudent for you to do further research and quote from a more scholarly source.
Dan