In Austria, the health advice call center can be reached nationwide under the phone number 1450. Following an initial assessment and if it is no medical emergency in the stricter sense, the callers receive general advice with regard to their illness or symptoms. Supported by a software (“Lowcode”), the callers are counseled, a severity assessment is carried out, and they are referred either to an office-based physician , nursing care at home, a primary care center, or a hospital.

Some callers describe concerns that are mainly of a psychosocial or socio-psychiatric nature, or exhibit a lack of organizational support structures. A Social Work clearinghouse connected to the 1450 call center could be integrated into the complex and diverse support landscape as an advice and referral agency.

This project explores the basic foundations for this. The following questions are at the center: Which “other” concerns are voiced by callers of 1450? Can any temporal patterns be observed? How could telephone counseling and Social Work clearing be carried out? Which conversation techniques and tools could be applied? What would a database for referral resources have to look like? Subsequently, the project participants will address the matter of international examples and partly standardized support options for this type of counseling situations.