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…]
Shared decision making with family carers is clearly espoused in policy in the UK and elsewhere. The researchers in this U.S. study were interested to look at to what extent parents of children with autism spectrum disorder reported being engaged in such shared decision making. They set out to look at the association between shared [read the full story…]
The WHO World Health Survey is a comprehensive international survey carried out across 70 countries, which uses face-to-face, telephone and online interviews to ask questions about the health of populations, public health risk factors, coverage and availability of health services and health care spending. The survey includes a number of questions relating to mental health [read the full story…]
The possible link between the MMR vaccine and autism has been shown to have no basis in evidence, despite such a link being posited in a 1998 paper in the Lancet. The paper was subsequently retracted following a GMC investigation of its author. The researchers in this US study point out that although the link [read the full story…]
Self injurious behaviour is usually defined as behaviour that directly results in physical harm to an individual and includes such behaviours as hand biting, head slapping, picking at skin, gouging or striking the body or eating inedible material. In addition, researchers have begun to include display of repetitive movements even though they may not immediately [read the full story…]
The NHS Information Centre have published their annual survey of secondary school pupils in England in years 7 to 11 (mostly aged 11 to 15). 6,519 pupils in 219 schools completed questionnaires in the autumn term of 2011. The survey report presents information on the percentage of pupils who have ever smoked, tried alcohol or [read the full story…]
The issue of faith and participation in faith communities for people with learning disabilities is not widely explored in the literature. In 2004, the foundation for people with learning disabilities published the report of a two-year action research project to develop and describe creative ideas for meeting people’s religious needs and produced a good practice [read the full story…]
The Department of Health have published the results of the first nationwide survey of bereaved relatives in England. The survey looked at the last 3 months of life and assessed the quality of care that people received and how this varied in different parts of the country and in different groups of patients. The postal [read the full story…]
In the UK as a whole the most recent estimate from an Action for Advocacy survey is that 55.4% of advocacy organisations provide services for people with learning disabilities, although there is growing concern about the precarious nature of funding for many of those services. The IHAL report points to the argument that the development [read the full story…]
Commissioners need to become adept at decommissioning. At a time of significant and sustained reductions in public spending and rising demand, commissioners are tasked to release funding for investment in effective models of service by actively challenging and taking resources out of less effective approaches. Drawing on examples of decommissioning and innovation from across the [read the full story…]
