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This article describes the changes in the population of people with learning disabilities in Sheffield and the associated demand for specialist learning disability services, primary and acute health services and the wider public realm. It comments particularly on people with the most complex needs. The study to produce this data was in two parts: an analysis of changes in the overall number of people with a learning disability which included a projection of how the number might change over the next ten years, and an analysis of the health and support needs of young people with profound and multiple learning disabilities (PMLD), and how these might change in the future. The findings are compelling. The overall number of people with a learning disability in Sheffield increased by 25% in the 10 years from 1998 to 2008, the number of children and young people with a learning disability increased by nearly 120% and young people with PMLD were found to have an unprecedented level of health and social care need, which will increase further as they enter adulthood. The implications of the findings are discussed and suggestions for further research are offered.

The purpose of this paper is to present information from the Joint Health and Social Care Self-Assessment Framework (JHSCSAF) on reported rates of cervical cancer, breast cancer and bowel cancer screening for eligible people with learning disabilities in England in 2012/2013 compared to screening rates for the general population.

Between 94 and 101 Learning Disability Partnership Boards, as part of the JHSCSAF, provided information to allow the calculation of rates of cervical cancer, breast cancer and bowel cancer screening in their locality, for eligible people with learning disabilities and for the population as a whole.

At a national level, reported cancer screening coverage for eligible people with learning disabilities was substantially lower than for the population as a whole (cervical cancer screening 27.6 per cent of people with learning disabilities vs 70 per cent of total population; breast cancer screening 36.8 per cent of people with learning disabilities vs 57.8 per cent of total population; bowel cancer screening 28.1 per cent of people with learning disabilities vs 40.5 per cent of the general population). There were considerable geographical variations in reported coverage for all three screening programmes.

Consistent with previous research, localities in England report cancer screening rates for eligible people with learning disabilities considerably below those of the general population. There is an urgent need to address data availability and quality issues, as well as reasonable adjustments to cancer screening programmes to ensure uniformly high rates of cancer screening for people with learning disabilities across England.

Psychosocial interventions are a core part of the service structures of mainstream mental health services. Research and clinical services for people with learning disabilities have often adopted a broadly psychosocial perspective. However, there is surprisingly little literature that considers psychosocial intervention for people with learning disabilities who have mental health problems. This paper describes the structure of psychosocial intervention and then considers the evidence base that is available to develop this approach for people with learning disabilities and mental health problems.

The life expectancy of people with learning disabilities has increased substantially. Services for older people with learning disabilities are provided by various sectors and practitioners (generic health and social care, or specialist learning disability or old age). The literature suggests that practitioners do not feel well‐equipped to support people with learning disabilities as they grow older, and older people's services do not always have the opportunity to share experiences and skills. This paper highlights areas such as dementia support, where the intersection between services is not clear, and explores what might help practitioners to meet the needs of people with learning disabilities as they grow older.

The general knowledge and skills of staff working with people with learning disabilities have been of interest for a number of years, and Valuing People (DH, 2001) highlighted them as a significant issue. Research has shown that there are further deficits in the knowledge and skills of staff concerning the mental health of people with learning disabilities. This paper gives a general overview of some of the factors involved in the training and knowledge of learning disabilities staff relating to mental health. Early indications from research have shown that training may be effective as a way of addressing these problems, but further research and clear guidance on best practice in implementing staff training are needed in this important area.

This paper aims to outline the process of undertaking the Confidential Inquiry (CI) into the deaths of people with learning disabilities and discusses three particular issues: engaging with professionals; maintaining confidentiality; and the tension between wanting to base the findings on a sufficiently large number of cases so that the findings are robust and reliable, but also wanting to make immediate changes to any potentially modifiable factors found to contribute to the deaths of people with learning disabilities.

The CI into the deaths of people with learning disabilities reviews the deaths of all people with learning disabilities living in the (former) Avon and Gloucestershire areas. It has been commissioned by the Department of Health to run until March 2013. One of the key drivers for a CI has been the work of Mencap in exposing the unequal health care that some people with learning disabilities received in the NHS.

The principal goal of the CI is to improve the standard and quality of care for people with learning disabilities and ultimately their health outcomes. The CI team aims to detect potentially modifiable contributory factors in the care of a person with learning disabilities who has subsequently died, share any examples of good practice in their care and provide information to guide the commissioning of services.

It is anticipated that the findings of the CI will provide a considerable amount of evidence on which to improve the standard and quality of care for people with learning disabilities and ultimately their health outcomes.

Findings and good practice are reported from a project promoting engagement of PCTs with the health experiences of people with learning disabilities. Project work was most successful where it linked into mainstream NHS priorities, using good information and specialists' expertise to support mainstream practitioners.

The article reviews the policy, legislation and literature on sex and relationships for people with learning disability, through a search of electronic databases, journals and other resources. It reviews the rights of people with learning disabilities to a sexual life and their views of service responses, sexual offences legislation and the link between sexual knowledge and practice. It also explores sexual orientation and preference among people with learning disabilities, differences between the genders and sexual offending, including consideration of ‘victimless’ offences. It concludes that the balance between empowering and protecting people with learning disabilities is challenging but important. Interventions to promote safer, healthier sexual behaviour need to address more than improving knowledge. We need to find out more about what people with learning disabilities think about their sexual experiences and how they are supported in this area.

There is now a vast amount of available information, research and policy on the transition of young people with learning disabilities to adulthood. These sources are informed by different professional philosophies and practices, resulting in a heterogeneous mass of data that can be confusing, contradictory and repetitive. In this review we provide an overview of recent publications about services for young people with learning disabilities at the time of transition, with particular focus on those with mental disorders including neurodevelopment disorders and/or challenging behaviour. We discuss their relevance to good practice and the implications for the future development of services for people with learning disabilities in the UK. We argue that, despite the qualitative differences between the experience of transition to adulthood for young people with learning disabilities and that of other young people, the principles of service provision remain the same. Developments in research and clinical practice in this field ought to reflect good practice, as well as embracing new methodologies, and benefit from advances in adolescents without learning disabilities.

Picking up from Cotter et al.’s article on the transferential process, the purpose of this paper is to set out some arguments about the ways of meeting the emotional needs of people with learning disabilities.

The commentary draws on two studies: one is about understanding and changing disabling practices, and the other is about bereavement support for people with learning disabilities. Both use qualitative approaches, and in both studies, people with learning disabilities are active agents or co-researchers, who have assisted in shaping the ideas and values of the research.

Professional practices, including those within the therapeutic context, can act as institutional barriers which create people with learning disabilities as passive or incompetent. However, this paper sets out some preliminary findings showing that not only can people with learning disabilities support each other, but also that face-to-face support workers can support people with learning disabilities to understand and cope with their emotions.

Frontline support workers should be seen as professionals, with their own range of resources to provide good emotional support. Further, people with learning disabilities can come together in groups to develop peer support about difficult and sensitive topics.

Talking about therapies for people with learning disabilities has long been overlooked. As their value is now recognised, it is important that the views and wishes of people with learning disabilities themselves are heard, so that they can contribute to the processes which support them.