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Useful services and external resources, for your care and career.
This is an expanding directory and current community suggestions are not definitive. Know of a service or resource that should be featured?
'Confidential Enquiry into Premature Deaths of People with Learning Disabilities' (CIPOLD) Report (Heslop, et al. 2013)
This report follows Death By Indifference, also listed on this page. This confidential enquiry looks further into to why people with learning disabilities sometimes live shorter lives than other people - and what we can do to change this.
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[UK CHARITY REPORT; INFORMATION APPLICABLE WORLDWIDE]
'Death By Indifference' (Mencap, 2007)
This report will set out why we believe there is institutional discrimination within the NHS, and why people with a learning disability get worse healthcare than non-disabled people. We present the stories of six people who we believe have died unnecessarily. We do so because healthcare professionals need to realise the serious - even fatal - consequences of their lack of understanding. We do so to point out that these professionals must work to ensure that such tragedies can never happen again' (Mencap, 2007).
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[UK CHARITY REPORT; INFORMATION APPLICABLE WORLDWIDE]
'How Social Care Staff can use Reasonable Adjustments to support the health of people with Learning Disabilities' (Public Health England 2017)
Reasonable adjustments are the changes the law says people or services must make so disabled people can use services as easily as everybody else. Putting reasonable adjustments in place can help people with learning disabilities get better healthcare and live longer.
This document lays out some tips and advice about how we can ensure individuals with learning disabilities have the reasonable adjustments they need in order to access healthcare safely and effectively.
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[UK GOVERNMENT DOCUMENT; INFORMATION APPLICABLE WORLDWIDE]
'Improving Healthcare Access for People with Learning Disabilities'
This link provides access to copies of government guidance to support your practice and build your skills. This includes information around common health needs, reasonable adjustments, mental capacity act, hospital admissions, pain management, dementia and palliative and end of life care for people with learning disabilities.
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[UK GOVERNMENT WEBSITE; INFORMATION APPLICABLE WORLDWIDE]
'Occupational Therapy for People with Learning Disabilities: Findings from a research study' (2010)
Authors:Lillywhite, A. and Haines, D. (2010)
Published by:(Royal) College of Occupational Therapists
This highlights key points from research undertaken by the (then) College of Occupational Therapists' 'Specialist Section: People with Learning Disabilities'. The research was commissioned with the aim of exploring and documenting the nature of occupational therapy with people with learning disabilities across the United Kingdom, from the perspectives of occupational therapists and support workers.
[UK PROFESSIONAL BODY; PDF INFORMATION APPLICABLE WORLDWIDE]
'Valuing People Now: a new three-year strategy for people with learning disabilities' (Department of Health, 2009)
Valuing People Now was published in 2009 as the UK Government's three-year strategy to improve and promote the rights, choice, inclusion and independence of individuals with learning disabilities.
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[UK GOVERNMENT REPORT; INFORMATION RELEVANT WORLDWIDE]
A Picture Of Health (NHS South of England)
Easy read information that can help people with learning disabilities better understand health, illness, lifestyle and treatments. This website has easy read information about lots of different health conditions.
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[UK NATIONAL HEALTH SERVICE WEBSITE; INFORMATION APPLICABLE WORLDWIDE]
Beyond Words
Empowering people through pictures.
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Beyond Words provides books and training to support people who find pictures easier to understand than words. Whether supporting somebody with a learning disability or communication difficulty, their products empower people through pictures.
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[UK-BASED SERVICE; SERVICES AVAILABLE INTERNATIONALLY]
Brandon Trust
Our charity exists to enable children, young people and adults with learning disabilities and autism to live life in the way they choose.
We do that by providing high-quality, individualised support that focuses on enabling people to achieve their dreams and truly live free.
British Institute of Learning Disabilities (BILD)
Professor Gerry Simon set up BILD in 1971, because he was convinced there could be better support in the community for people with disabilities. They’ve been championing the rights of people with disabilities ever since.
BILD uses its skills, knowledge and experience to turn policy into practice, solve problems and improve support. In working with Government departments, local authorities, health trusts, service providers and mainstream organisations, our aim is to improve the quality of the lives of people with disabilities (BILD 2017).
The BILD website has a range of resources for service users, family, carers, support workers and professionals around how to effectively support and work with individuals with learning disabilities.
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[UK CHARITY; INFORMATION APPLICABLE WORLDWIDE]
Challenging Behaviour and Learning Disabilities: prevention and interventions for people with learning disabilities whose behaviour challenges (NICE Guidelines, 2015)
This guideline covers interventions and support for children, young people and adults with a learning disability and behaviour that challenges. It highlights the importance of understanding the cause of behaviour that challenges, and performing thorough assessments so that steps can be taken to help people change their behaviour and improve their quality of life. The guideline also covers support and intervention for family members or carers.
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[UK PUBLIC BODY GUIDELINES; INFORMATION APPLICABLE WORLDWIDE]
Communicating with people with a learning disability (Mencap)
This information is designed to provide a brief introduction to communication and the problems faced by someone with a learning disability. It also contains tips on how you can be a better communicator, and how you can help someone with a learning disability get their message across.
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[UK CHARITY; INFORMATION APPLICABLE WORLDWIDE]
Down's Syndrome Association
The only organisation in the UK focusing solely on all aspects of living successfully with Down’s syndrome.
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[UK CHARITY; INFORMATION APPLICABLE WORLDWIDE]
Easy Health
This website has lots of easy read resources around health, food and exercise and videos that are accessible for use when working with individuals with learning disabilities.
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[UK WEBSITE; INFORMATION APPLICABLE WORLDWIDE]
Easy-Read Information about Mental Health (Peter Bates)
Some people with learning disabilities need to use mental health services, but can find that these services are not well informed about how to support them. One part of good support is the provision of easy read information about mental health services, human rights and psychiatric treatment.
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[UK WEBSITE; INFORMATION APPLICABLE WORLDWIDE]
Foundation for People with Learning Disabilities
Our aim is to ensure that people with learning disabilities continue to get better lives. We do this by gaining knowledge, improving practice and influencing of policy through our work directly with people with learning disabilities. We believe that people with learning disabilities should have the same rights and the same choices as everyone else in society” (Foundation for People with Learning Disabilities, 2017).
The Foundation for People with Learning Disabilities work in the following key areas:
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Employment and education
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Family, friends and community
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Rights and equality
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Health and Well Being
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Getting the right support
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Changing service delivery
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[UK CHARITY; INFORMATION APPLICABLE WORLDWIDE]
Learning Disability England
Learning Disability England is a charity and membership organisation working to make life better for people with learning disabilities and their families. Learning Disability England brings together people with learning disabilities, families and friends and organisations so that we can do more and shout louder.
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[UK-BASED CHARITY]
Look Hear Australia
Look Hear Australia focuses on bringing the top resources and resource pages, on children with complex and additional needs, together under one site. Our motto is "it's not hard to make it easy" and we strive to make the search for quality information, programs, equipment and resources easy.
[AUSTRALIA-BASED RESOURCE; INFORMATION APPLICABLE WORLDWIDE]
MyLiferaft
MyLiferaft is an online place for an individual’s health and well-being information that helps to connect them to you and others in their care circle. All their information is stored safely and easily, allowing only those that they choose to be able to access it.
It’s not just about the facts and figures; they can store information such as “I love a cup of tea with my medication!” or “I’m scared of injections!” This allows those that care for them to know what helps them to feel better, and their care circle to feel better informed to support them.
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[UK: SOUTHAMPTON-BASED SERVICE; AVAILABLE NATIONWIDE]
NICE Guidelines and Quality Standards (Learning Disabilities)
NICE Guidelines - Review the evidence across broad health and social care topics:
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Care and support of people growing older with learning disabilities
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Challenging behaviour and learning disabilities: prevention and interventions for people with learning disabilities whose behaviour challenges
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Learning disabilities and behaviour that challenges: service design and delivery
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Mental health problems in people with learning disabilities: prevention, assessment and management
Quality Standards - Set out priority areas for quality improvement in health and social care:
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[UK-BASED ORGANISATION; INFORMATION APPLICABLE WORLDWIDE]
Safeguarding: Easy-read leaflets (Newham London)
Some easy read leaflets about hate crime, keeping safe at home and keeping safe while out and about, to support individuals with learning disabilities to better understand these issues, and how they can stay safe.
[UK BOROUGH COUNCIL WEBSITE; INFORMATION RELEVANT WORLDWIDE]
Scottish Commission for Learning Disability
The Scottish Commission for Learning Disability (SCLD) is the lead strategic partner to the Scottish Government in the delivery of learning disability strategy and policy.
Sensory World
Sensory world was set up as a tool to support individuals with learning disabilities to learn to use computers and to fill a gap in provision of an accessible website for adults with learning disabilities. Sensory World is designed to be a fun place to learn, with a wide range of stimulating and appropriate activities.
[UK WEBSITE; INFORMATION APPLICABLE WORLDWIDE]
The Learning Disabilities Elf
The Learning Disabilities Elf aims to bring you the latest learning disabilities evidence that is published each week.
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We scan the most important websites, databases and journals and select evidence that is relevant to health and social care professionals with an interest in learning disabilities.
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[UK-BASED ORGANISATION; INFORMATION APPLICABLE WORLDWIDE]
The Learning Disabilities Mortality Review
The Learning Disabilities Mortality Review (LeDeR) programme was established to support local areas to review the deaths of people with learning disabilities, identify learning from those deaths, and take forward the learning into service improvement initiatives.
Yellow Submarine (Oxford)
Yellow Submarine is an award-winning Oxfordshire charity, that believes people with learning disabilities and autism deserve to live life to the full.
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We tackle the problem that many people with learning disabilities leave school with limited life skills and as a result poor life chances. This often leads to isolation and being marginalised. Our projects start working with young people in community settings from the age of 11 onwards, to build their social skills, confidence, independence and ultimately their employability.
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[UK: OXFORD-BASED SERVICE]