John Northfield

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After qualifying as a social worker, John worked in community learning disability teams before getting involved in a number of long-stay hospital closure programmes, working to develop individual plans for people moving into their own homes. He worked for BILD, helping to develop the Quality Network and was editorial lead for the NHS electronic library learning disabilities specialist collection. This led him to found the Learning Disabilities Elf site with Andre Tomlin as a way of making the evidence accessible to practitioners in health and social care. Most recently he has worked as part of Mencap's national quality team and also been involved in a number of national website developments, including the General Medical Council's learning disabilities site.

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Continued low rate of use of appropriate adults for detainees with learning disabilities and ADHD cause for concern

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Background Last week we posted about the recent multi agency inspection of responses to people with learning disabilities in the criminal justice system which suggested that information was poorly shared and that significant improvements were possible. The researchers in this study worked in a large London metropolitan police station and were interested in looking at [read the full story…]

Scoping Review finds insufficient evidence on impact of personalisation in lives of people with learning disabilities

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Background Personalisation at its simplest is about starting with one person at the centre of any process concerned with responding to social care (and increasingly, health care) needs. SCIE have suggested that this will require ‘significant transformation’ of adult social care services, structures and processes, with implications for the role of social workers. The researchers [read the full story…]

Needs of people with learning disabilities in criminal justice system not being met

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Background We know that people with learning disabilities in the criminal justice system can be especially vulnerable, and the recent Bradley report highlighted a number of approaches that could be taken to prevent this vulnerable group being caught in the revolving door of the criminal justice system. It is unclear however how many people with [read the full story…]

Atlas maps health of adults with learning disabilities in Ontario, Canada

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Background We have posted extensively about the current state of knowledge around the health care needs of people with learning disabilities and the nature of the responses by UK health providers. The Mencap Getting it Right campaign launched after the publication of Death by Indifference’, aims to support local campaigners, health professionals, GP surgeries, hospitals [read the full story…]

Outcome measure for psychological therapy for people with learning disabilities developed as part of inclusive research process

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Background Since the publication of Positive Practice Guidance on access to psychological therapies there have been a number of studies looking at the barriers to such access and some of the approaches to ensure reasonable adjustments are made. The researchers in this study were concerned that the tools being used to evaluate the of impact [read the full story…]

Review finds lack of published, robust evidence on impact of advocacy in social care services

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Background A recent report from the Improving Health and Lives team suggested that over half of the advocacy organisations in the UK provide services for people with learning disabilities. The report pointed out that given the increasing move towards personalisation and the changes taking place in the organization of commissioning, that there was likely to [read the full story…]

Exploration of views of resident in-patients with learning disabilities identifies key themes

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Background Offering choice to patients is at the heart of the NHS, supported by a set of legal rights (see the Choice Framework) and patient led assessments of care environments have been introduced  (PLACE) applying to hospitals, hospices and day treatment centres providing NHS funded care. At present this covers only care environments, not clinical care [read the full story…]

Care and support of older people with learning disabilities chosen for NICE social care quality guidance and standards in 2015

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Background NICE (National Institute of Health and Care Excellence) provides guidance and quality standards for health and social care in England. Its evidence-based guidance is produced to support health and social care professionals to ensure that support provided they is of the best possible quality and offers the best value for money. Following a Department [read the full story…]

Predictors of outcomes of police involvement in behavioural crises analysed in Canadian study

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Background Published research in the last few years has shed some light on the experiences of people with learning disabilities in the criminal justice system, with significant evidence emerging of their vulnerability. The authors of this current study however, were interested in the ways in which people might, or might not, become involved in the [read the full story…]

Eye Movement Desensitisation and reprocessing impacts on symptoms of PTSD in adult with learning disabilities

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Background Some time ago, we posted about a case study with two individuals with learning disabilities, where the researchers used eye movement desensitisation and reprocessing (EMDR) to achieve a decrease in posttraumatic stress disorder -like symptoms Eye movement desensitisation is an approach that developed out of work in the late 80s, based on observations that [read the full story…]