Further Reading
A Change in Thinking
At Care Bridge Specialists we are committed to thinking about and putting into action the things we need to with the different groups and people that we need to work together with to: 1. Improve the quality of care for people with learning disabilities and autism. 2. Improve the quality of their lives. 3. Enhance the community capacity and provision that meets their needs.
Mental Health and Autism
People with autism are more likely to experience mental health problems than the general population. This can be because there are fewer resources and support to help develop their coping skills. Or because they often experience more negative life events and face stigma and discrimination from both people and services. It’s vital that Care Bridge Specialists are able to properly identify mental health problems so that the people we support can get the care at the right time. Our Practitioners channel their passion, skills and expertise to remove the disabling conditions of life and promote the enabling ones and are fully committed to challenge and encourage every person that we support to celebrate themselves just the way they are.
Autism Keynotes – Dame Stephanie Shirley
Dame Stephanie Shirley is an ardent venture philanthropist with an unrelenting energy for creating positive change. She has lived experience of caring for and loving a son with autism. Having read ‘Let It Go’ and met Stevie in person Care Bridge Specialists are in awe of the number of pioneering projects in autism that she has initiated and how tirelessly she has worked to improve the lives of the autistic community. Her work helps to inspire our own commitment to provide support for people with learning disabilities and autism to live fulfilled and meaningful lives in the community so that they do not miss the happiness and joy that is contained in the smaller everyday moments of life.
Baroness Hollins – Long Term Segregation
Baroness Sheila Hollins is Chairperson of the Independent Care and Treatment Review process for people with learning disabilities or autism in inpatient settings. She says that returning individuals from inpatient units to communities will never work until people understand that it’s not about building a staff team, or about rotas and procedures. It is about putting the individual at the centre of the plans”. Much of the work that we do at Care Bridge Specilaists is shaped by the fact that people with learning disabilties and autism don’t just deserve to ‘live’ and be supported in the community they deserve to ‘belong’ to it.
Capable Environments -Foundation of Support
People with autism are often highly sensitive to their environment. This can mean different things to different people on the spectrum but, in general, people with autism have unusually delicate sensory systems and their senses—sight, hearing, touch, smell, and taste—can be easily overloaded. Care Bridge Specialists Practitioners support people with learning disabilties and autism by building and creating capable environments that can accommodate their characteristics and minimise any maladaptive or challenging behaviour that is so often a reactive expression of discomfort or a way of them expressing themselves and releasing anxiety in an environment that is triggering them to feel flooded and overwhelmed.
Dr M.Seligman – Applied Positive Psychology
Dr Martin Seligman is called the “ Father of Positive Psychology ”. He has led visionary leaps in the scientific research, empirical data and personal understandings of human flourishing. Optimism, resilience and kindness are some of the key traits at the core of positive psychology and they enhance the ability that Care Bridge Specialist Practitioners have to meet the high support needs of people with learning disabilties and autism. We aim (sharing accountability with the Multi Disciplinary Teams that we work with) to remove the disabling conditions of life and build enabling ones. We meet individuals where they are and we take time to understand their past traumas and experiences, their present behaviours and challenges and their future aspirational hopes and dreams.
Neurodiversity- Using a Different Road Map
Neurodiversity was a term coined by Judy Singer in 1997. It is the idea that it’s normal and acceptable for people to have brains that function differently from one another. Rather than thinking there is something wrong or problematic when some people don’t operate similarly to others, neurodiversity embraces the differences in both brain function and behavioral traits as a natural element of how diverse the human population is. An understanding of neurodiversity allows us to look at each other and appreciate the ways we function differently. Instead of thinking there are “right” and “wrong” ways of functioning, we can embrace all of these differences and help all individuals to learn and behave in the ways that suit them best.
PBS – Making Sense of Behaviour
Postive Behavour Support recognises that behaviour is a form of communication and therefore that challenging behaviour is often a way of communicating an unmet need. Care Bridge Specialists Practitoners are trained in Positive Behaviour Support. They use the person centred approach of PROACT-SCIPr-UK® and comply with Restraint Reduction Network (RRN) Standards. Our emphasis is on a whole approach to support prevention rather than intervention and our aim is to raise a person’s self-esteem, improve quality of life and empower them to live a more independent and fulfilling life.
Seeing Life Through a Different Window
Autism is highly variable. The word ‘spectrum’ refers to how autism is experienced differently by different people however, there are some characteristics that are commonly shared. Autistic people attend to the detail. They are good at seeing patterns or solutions. They are often very good at understanding and working with structured systems and they can be passionately interested in certain things. They react and interact diffrently with external factors and they process and perceive things diffrently too. Their differences make them unique but more needs to be done to increase public understanding of autism. Communities need to be more accessible, inclusive and understanding places for autistic people to learn, work and live. Care Bridge Specialists are passionate about personalising our support models and services to help all people with autism and learning disabilities to be heard and acccepted and to live with freedom, choice, dignity and control.
The Importance of Kindness
The simple truth is that in times of crisis we all hope that people we know well and those we have never met will provide a bridge of support. To flourish and thrive, we all need connection to feel human as well as relationships that enrich and sustain us. People with autism and learning disabilities also need experts like Care Bridge Specialists who make caring for others the story of their lives. They need the competency and understanding of highly skilled practitioners who can meet them where they are, together with the hand of friendship that lends empathy and light when they need it most.
Consistency, Continuity and Co-Ordination
Three C’s of consistency, continuity ad co-ordination are key ingredients for people with learning disabilities and autism to live their best lives. We must be mindful that it can take greater time for people with learning disabilities and autism to feel comfortable. They will invariably have difficulty adjusting to changes in their routine and any time spent in a long stay hospital setting will have been challenging and stressful for them. This is compounded by the bright lights, loud noises and additional inconsistencies of multiple changes to their nursing and care staff. When Care Bridge Specialists select our Practitioner teams we do so knowing that the conistency of the ‘same team’ to support on the good days and bad days throughout the 8 steps of our Bridging Support/ Transition Model is crucial. Consistency in relationships, environment, approach, and routine greatly assists people with autism and learning disabilities to cope with daily living and to go on to flourish and thrive.
What Matters to You
The Care Bridge mission statement is “To provide people with autism and learning disabilities and high support needs with a bridge to bettter by facilitating complex transitions at key times in their lives”. We know that the majority of long stay hospitals where people with learning disabilities and and autism are treated do not offer a “therapeutic environment”. We know that when choice making is restricted, decisions are imposed, and adverse events are repeatedly experienced people with learning disabilities and autism can simply give up. We are intentional about the high trust relationships we build we take time to ask every person that we support what would really make them happy. Over time they come to know and respond to the secure feeling that ‘there are people in this world who really care about me’.