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This chapter qualitatively explored the impact of including parent liaisons (i.e., parents with lived experience caring for a child with complex needs, who support other caregivers in navigating child and family needs) in a case conferencing model for children with complex medical/social needs. Case conferences are used to address fragmented care, shared decision-making, and set patient-centered goals. Seventeen semi-structured interviews were conducted with clinicians and parent liaisons to assess the involvement of parent liaisons in case conferencing. Two main themes included benefits of parent liaison involvement (10 subthemes) and challenges to parent liaison involvement (5 subthemes). Clinicians reported that liaison participation and support of patients reduced stress for clinicians as well as family members. Challenges to liaison involvement included clinical team/parent liaison communication delays, which were further exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic. Parent liaison involvement in case conferences is perceived to be beneficial to children with complex needs, their families, and the clinical team. Integration of liaisons ensures the familial perspective is included in clinical goal setting.

National mental health policies in the UK have a common theme of seeking to develop working partnerships between people who use mental health services, their families and carers and professionals. In Somerset, following a staff training programme, a Family Liaison Service has been developed whereby systemically trained staff work alongside inpatient staff to hold family meetings as part of the assessment and admission process on all wards for working age adults and older people. This article aims to focus on this initiative.

The article considers the development of the Family Liaison Service and evaluates its progress based on audit data, feedback from families using the service, and a survey of staff experience. Issues raised in developing family inclusive services are discussed.

Evaluation of the service suggests that, although there is still progress to be made, considerable success has been achieved in embedding the service on inpatient units with a substantial increase in meetings held between staff and families. Feedback from families is positive and staff report increased confidence in engaging with families and carers.

This article describes a transferable model for the implementation of national policy to develop working partnerships with families and carers in mainstream mental health services.

Families of children with disabilities experience many challenges, which Sparkle’s Family Liaison Service (FLS) aims to alleviate. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the impact of the service.

Qualitative interviews with ten families who had accessed the FLS and 14 professionals working with children with disabilities were conducted in 2020. Interview transcripts were analysed using inductive and deductive thematic analysis.

Families valued an accessible service and a neutral individual who could empathise with them. Professionals highlighted the FLS relieving pressure they felt to provide informal support for families they work with, resulting in considerable time saving.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first evaluation of the novel FLS meeting the unmet needs of families of children with disabilities. The service equips and empowers caregivers to enhance their own lives and the lives of their children and family.

The purpose of this paper is to consider the key themes highlighted by Collins et al., in light of the wider research evidence base on informal sources of support for families of children with intellectual and developmental disabilities.

This commentary reflects on the provision of informal support services for families of children with intellectual and developmental disabilities.

The wider literature highlights the key role of family support in shifting negative narratives concerning parenting a child with intellectual and developmental disabilities, the impact of austerity and COVID-19 on support provision and the importance of services working effectively in collaboration to promote self-determination for families and individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities.

Continued efforts to explore how services and informal social supports might work together in an effective manner are key to improving the quality of life of parents caring for children with intellectual and developmental disabilities.

The purpose of this paper is to address the phenomenology of family members of homicide victims; known as “co-victims”. In particular, co-victims experiences of the criminal justice system (CJS) in England and Wales.

In 2018, 10 kV methodology facilitated an electronic-focus group. Anonymously, volunteers from families of homicide victims responded to key questions in a session entitled “a conversation which matters: confidence”. The thematic analysis presents the responses to three questions around “what works” and “what does not” in CJS practice.

The responses indicate four themes in relation to confidence building: communication and information; outcome; honesty and fairness; and family support. Responses indicate three themes in relation to what the CJS does well: family liaison officers, homicide detectives and court services. Responses indicate three themes in relation to what is not working: court proceedings, police budget cuts and preventative interventions.

The research considers benefits and limitations of methodology and makes suggestions for how these facets could be addressed by future research.

The research findings reveal good practice and points for attention to support confidence building in the CJS. Amongst other considerations, the work advances CJS practical good practice principles from the perspective of co-victims: education, interpersonal relations, working together, communication and justice.

Findings are of value to CJS policy makers, training and education for co-victim support, police and academics.

The purpose of this paper is to provide an outline of the strengths and weaknesses of selected models of police‐based victim services. It aims to provide an overview of the current predominant models of police‐based victim support in the USA, Canada, UK and Australia. It also aims to advance a typology of police‐based victim services as a useful analytic tool for understanding the varying models.

The research was based on extensive documentary analysis supplemented by semi‐structured interviews with 17 practitioners in the USA, Canada and Australia. Sites were selected for interview based on documentary research which indicated that they had developed police‐based victim services in their organization that were either particularly representative or innovative.

Police‐based victim services can be categorized into three broad models: unit services, dedicated liaison officer services, and referral services. Each model has strengths and weaknesses in terms of service delivery and police organization. Unit services may be optimum in delivering services but are also resource‐intensive and may be beyond the financial scope of some police organizations. They also potentially risk sequestering victim services within police organizations and reinforcing a view that dealing with victims of crime is not “real policing”. Dedicated officer services require significant institutional input to achieve their goals, while referral models necessitate workable mechanisms for inter‐agency cooperation. Thus police organizations need a clear perception of their victim services delivery role and how this might best be achieved.

The academic literature on police‐based victim services remains scant. This paper makes a valuable contribution to the literature by providing a useful typology for the analysis of police‐based victim services and the assessment of their strengths and weaknesses. The typology will prove useful for future empirical case‐studies of individual police‐based victim services.

The purpose of this paper is to illustrate the difficulties patients with intellectual disabilities face when they present to a general hospital with ambiguous symptoms and highlights the importance of adequate training for general staff in caring for people with learning disabilities.

The authors describe the pathway of a person with a learning disability and mental health problems from A&E, through a general hospital, to discharge and the problems encountered in terms of diagnostic clarity and subsequent treatment.

Delay in recognising a psychiatric cause for his symptoms and wrongly attributing his symptoms to his learning disability may have led to a protracted admission and invasive tests.

Education of healthcare professionals and proactive liaison work can help improve outcomes for people with intellectual disabilities when they are admitted to generic services.

This chapter is about the multiple forms of collaboration that are crucial to designing and implementing a school and community-based early childhood teacher preparation program. Maintaining quality in education and teacher education is a systemic, interdependence among individuals, institutions, and local, state, and national policy makers. We conclude that teacher education redesign is less about courses and pedagogies and more about systemic relationships, routines, and evaluations over time.

Each year, our university’s small community welcomes 200 refugees. Many refugee children’s schooling is interrupted due to long waits in refugee camps, so they need additional educational opportunities. Families from the refugee community and representatives from the Church World Services, a local refugee-resettlement agency, partnered with James Madison University to create a summer program that provides children from the refugee community with more support in English and reading. Creativity And Reading Education (CARE) is a summer program for Pre-K-3rd grade children in the refugee community that integrates creativity and English/literacy development by utilizing community-based field trips for real-world connections and applications. Pre-service teachers in this six-credit experience planned and facilitated morning meetings, integrated literacy/creativity activities, read aloud sessions, and vocabulary focused on field trips. We partnered with the schools and recruited 16 pre-service teachers, 30 children, and 10 parents to participate in the three-week program. This chapter explicates how CARE was conceptualized and implemented during its pilot year. We highlight our community partnerships, illuminate challenges and lessons learned, and explain next steps as the subsequent iteration of the CARE program that evolves to serve more students and families.