Oral care and people with learning disabilities

Public Health England, March 2019
This contains information about oral care and dental treatment for people with learning disabilities. It aims to help staff in dental teams to provide services that are accessible to people with learning disabilities. There is information about how learning disability staff can support this. It is also intended to be of use to family carers and paid supporters who help someone with their daily oral care and with accessing dental services.
Click here to view the guidance.

Love Life: resources for young people with learning disabilities

NSPCC, March 2019
These films and supporting resources are aimed at young people with a learning disability aged 11 to 25 to help them learn strategies for staying safe as they grow up and gain independence.
They enable adults to start conversations with young people about:

  • feelings
  • privacy and boundaries
  • friendship
  • different kinds of love
  • online safety.

Click here to access the resource.

The British Journal of Psychiatry – March 2019

The March edition of British Journal of Psychiatry is now available.  This issue includes articles on associations of adverse childhood experiences and social support with self-injurious behaviour and suicidality in adolescents, childhood abuse and psychotic experiences in adulthood, and electroconvulsive therapy and later stroke in patients with affective disorders.
Click here to view the table of contents.  Login with your LCFT OpenAthens account to view the full text articles.

The State of Ageing in 2019

Centre for Ageing Better, March 2019
This report uses publicly available data to give a snapshot of what life is like for people aged 65 and older today. It then investigates the prospects for people currently in their 50s and 60s with regards to work, finances, health, housing and community support.  It looks at the implications of an increasingly ageing society for the individual, government, business and wider society.
Click here to view the full report.

Keeping kids safe: improving safeguarding responses to gang violence and criminal exploitation

Children’s Commissioner for England, March 2019
This report estimates there are 27,000 children in England who identify as a gang member, only a fraction of whom are known to children’s services. It recommends that the government needs to make child criminal exploitation a national priority, and lay out clear expectations about the role of all organisations working with children – including the police, schools, children’s services and NHS bodies. There also needs to be more support from the NHS, including better mental health support for children at risk of gang membership and exclusion.
Click here to view the full report.

Exploring dementia and agitation: how public policy needs to respond

International Longevity Centre UK, March 2019
The MARQUE (Managing Agitation and Raising Quality of Life in Dementia) project is the largest ever study involving people living in care homes.  The study examined critical issues for people living with dementia and their paid and unpaid carers, particularly around the challenges of agitation. This report summarises a number of key findings from the study and makes recommendations for how public policy should respond.
Click here to view the full report.

Mental health services: addressing the care deficit

NHS Providers, March 2019
This report looks at the levels of demand reported by frontline leaders across the range of services they provide, and examines what lies behind the growing pressures.  In particular the report identifies widespread concerns about benefits cuts and the impact of universal credit. It also suggests that loneliness, homelessness and financial hardship are adding to pressures on NHS mental health services.
Click here to view the full report.

Improving patient safety through collaboration: a rapid review of the academic health science networks’ patient safety collaboratives

The ASHN Network, March 2019
This report discusses the progress and impact made by England’s Patient Safety Collaboratives (PSCs) in their first four years. It was commissioned by The AHSN Network and written by The King’s Fund. The report notes how interest is shifting from supporting the improvement of individual services to improving how different services work together in local systems. It highlights the role the PSC programme has had in creating a movement for change and cultivating a shared vision among health and care organisations. It also suggests some areas PSCs and national NHS bodies could focus on to further support innovation, quality improvement and patient safety.
Click here to view the full report.