There is an increasing focus on how organisations that support people with learning disabilities can move to a position where they can deliver personalised services. In Control has provided a range of reports on the evaluation of the use of personal budgets and a recent publication by Helen Sanderson Associates, Creating Person Centred Organisations has [read the full story…]
The Prison Reform Trust work in 2008 suggested that people with learning disabilities in the UK faced ‘personal, systemic and routine’ discrimination from the point of arrest through to release from prison. This Australian study looked at the experience of people in the state of Victoria. The researchers were interested in the experiences and perceptions [read the full story…]
Most local authorities are attempting to offer a range of services in response to the need for respite or a short break. Authorities have recognised the need to offer services therefore that attempt to meet the needs of carers and the people with disabilities, by ensuring that short breaks are responsive to people using services, [read the full story…]
The notion of the therapeutic community emerged in the 1940s and was developed in the UK throughout the subsequent decades. Therapeutic communities developed participative approaches to working with people with long term mental illness. Usually residential, they offered a complete therapeutic milieu with therapists and patients living in the same environment and within the same [read the full story…]
Yesterday saw the release of the serious case review relating to the appalling treatment of people at the Winterbourne View care home, as exposed in the BBC Panorama programme last year. The review, chaired by Margaret Flynn, points to a lack of leadership amongst commissioners, as well as criticising the role of the Care Quality [read the full story…]
A US review in 2009 suggested that the evidence on the rates of sex offending by people with learning disabilities was equivocal at best with some studies reporting an increased likelihood of people with learning disabilities committing sexual offences, with others suggesting the opposite to be the case. There are difficulties in answering the question [read the full story…]
One of the ongoing themes of posts on this site is the well-documented view that people with learning disabilities are more likely to have difficulties with health issues and are less likely to have good access to healthcare to help them to manage those difficulties. However, there is now a growing body of advice and [read the full story…]
Last year, the BBC screened its secret filming at the Winterbourne view home in Bristol which showed shocking scenes of abuse. The subsequent inquiry led to arrests and convictions, but there were concerns that this was not an isolated incident. The care services minister stated his determination to strengthen safeguards and the Care Standards Commission [read the full story…]
One of the key findings of the early research into community services for people with learning disabilities who had lived in long stay institutions, was that the quality of first line management was one of the main factors affecting outcomes. This Australian study set out to look at the work of front-line managers in supported [read the full story…]
A number of recent inquiries have highlighted the concern that people with learning disabilities may on occasion be denied access to their basic human rights. The authors of this study set out to explore this concern in relation to approaches to risk management taken in services, which they suggest may focus too much on professional [read the full story…]
