Researchers in this Australian study were concerned to consider the issue of planning for future care and support of people with learning disabilities after the death of parental caregivers. They were considered the need to adapt support systems to ensure the best possible quality of life for people with intellectual disability as they grow older. [read the full story…]
The press release from NICE says that: Quality standards are a set of specific, concise statements and associated measures [that] set out aspirational, but achievable, markers of high-quality, cost-effective patient care, covering the treatment and prevention of different diseases and conditions. NICE have already published quality standards on dementia and depression in adults and they have [read the full story…]
There continues to be some debate about the numbers of people with learning disabilities in UK prisons, partly due to the lack of consensus on definitions of learning disability in studies and different approaches to establishing the boundaries between learning difficulty, borderline learning disability and learning disability. The Bradley report recommended amongst its key recommendations [read the full story…]
Given the emphasis in education on inclusion in mainstream schools and colleges for young people with additional needs, this project set out to enable young people with learning difficulties in three localities to bring about changes in their schools and colleges. The young people themselves chose the areas they wanted to focus on, which were: [read the full story…]
Active Support concerns training staff in working practices and organisational procedures in homes to help provide direct support for resident participation and increase levels of engagement in activities. The researchers in this study looked at the effect of staffing levels, e.g. either one or two staff on the amount of assistance provided to people with [read the full story…]
There are a number of cross-sectional studies that investigate antidepressant use in teenagers and young adults. These are interesting, but because they don’t tend to follow-up study participants prospectively over a long period of time, there is only so much we can learn from them. However, now researchers in Finland have published a study that [read the full story…]
Researchers in Canada working with people with learning disabilities and mental health problems set out in this study to understand what happens when such individuals experience a psychiatric emergency. They looked at the experience of those people living with their families when such emergencies occurred, to consider what additional services families might need, including going [read the full story…]
Personalisation is a cornerstone of policy for supporting people with learning disabilities. This study set out to look at the nature, purposes and outcomes of personalised residential supports from the perspectives of people with disabilities, family members and service providers, with a view to developing a quality framework for future evaluation. The researchers identified four [read the full story…]
We know very little about how to increase the safety and wellbeing of mothers who experience intimate partner violence. A good deal of the research in this field focuses on treatments delivered by health professionals, but this cluster randomised trial from Melbourne Australia looked at the impact that non-professional mentor support can have in reducing [read the full story…]
Maximising choice and control are key elements of policy in relation to supporting people with learning disabilities, but it is recognised that the choice of where to live and with whom is often denied to people, especially with severe or profound learning disabilities. The researchers in this USA study set out to understand the current [read the full story…]
