Last September I blogged about a cohort study in the Lancet that highlighted the links between self-harm and poor physical health. This same dataset (drawn from over 30,000 patients from 6 hospitals in Oxford, Manchester and Derby from 2000-7) has now spawned a longitudinal study published in the European Child and Adolescent Psychiatry journal. This [read the full story…]
There are more and more examples of mainstream mental health services supporting people with learning disabilities when they have mental health problems. The authors of this cross sectional study were keen to explore whether the attitudes of staff in mainstream mental health services towards people with learning disabilities was in any way negative and whether [read the full story…]
Studies have suggested that anti-psychotic medications comprise between 30–50% of all psychotropics prescribed for people with learning disabilities, often prescribed for people with challenging behaviours with no diagnosis of mental illness. Reviews of their use have suggested however that there is no strong evidence supporting the anti-aggressive properties of anti-psychotics. This study in Australia was [read the full story…]
We have posted before about the factors which may impact on staff burnout in services supporting people with learning disabilities. Some of the studies we identified have suggested that personal and organisational supports increasing a sense of personal achievement for staff can provide a buffer against emotional exhaustion and that interventions related to improving mindfulness might [read the full story…]
The research and campaigns relating to life outcomes for people with schizophrenia and psychosis are truly shocking. It seems unbelievable that people with schizophrenia face a lifespan 15-20 years shorter than the general population and that only 7% are able to hold down a job. Paul Jenkins from Rethink Mental Illness sums it up nicely: [read the full story…]
Getting feedback about interventions from people with learning disabilities involves a number of challenges, including of course communication difficulties The researchers in this study were interested in how occupational therapists (OT’s) gathered feedback from people who used their services. They looked at this by asking 70 OT’s to complete a questionnaire and a subset of [read the full story…]
In the wake of the outcome of last week’s court proceedings involving support staff who worked at Winterbourne View hospital, there have been continuing calls to ensure that people with learning disabilities and complex needs are not placed far from home in isolated services, but receive local, skilled support. The Mansell report drew attention to [read the full story…]
A new cross-sectional survey published in The Lancet has revealed some unsurprising but nonetheless sobering facts about how people with depression are stigmatised. The research team, funded by money from the European Commission, interviewed 1,082 people with depression from 35 countries across the world. They used the discrimination and stigma scale (version 12; DISC-12) to [read the full story…]
The ADHD Voices (Voices On Identity, Childhood, Ethics and Stimulants) report was published yesterday and received a significant amount of press coverage. The outcomes of this work are a 46-page report and 18-minute video, that aim to inspire a fresh public conversation about the ethics of Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) diagnosis and stimulant drug treatments [read the full story…]
National and international research consistently shows that the most significant factor in raising educational achievement is the employment and retention of good quality teachers. Teacher recruitment and retention; an historical context In recent history, the UK Government has introduced many initiatives to tackle the problems of teacher recruitment and retention (Menter, 2002), including bursaries for [read the full story…]
