In the theoretical part of my thesis, I present moral distress as a theoretical concept and connect it with professional identity, ethical principles and values of social work. Social workers experience moral distress when they feel that they are unable to act in accordance with the values of the profession due to systemic, institutional barriers and other circumstances, and that their professional integrity is thus threatened. In the empirical part, I present the results of a qualitative research in which I conducted narrative interviews with 6 social workers employed at social work centres or in the programs implemented by the social work centres. Participants face moral distress due to staff shortages, time constraints, lack of mentoring and the feeling that it is increasingly difficult to provide service users with the help they need. Despite the high workload, they try to uphold the values of social work; they develop strategies for coping with moral distress and demonstrate moral courage.
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