Mersey Care launch Learning Disability and Autism Strategic Plan

A new learning disability and autism strategic plan has been published outlining Mersey Care’s goals for how we will transform our care and treatment for people with a learning disability and autistim leading up to 2028.

The new plan aims to help the Trust’s staff to work towards providing excellent care and treatment for people with a learning disability and autistic people so they are supported to live full and healthy lives.

Dr Alex Cookson, Associate Director for Learning Disability and Autism said: “We know from NHS reports like the Long Term Plan, the Autism Act the Autism Strategy and the Transforming Care Programme that people who are autistic and people with a learning disability traditionally face challenges in accessing healthcare services.

“People with a learning disability and autistic people have been more likely to be inappropriately admitted to a mental health inpatient setting due to the gaps in community support and also experience an over reliance in the use of medication as opposed to other interventions.

“Also people with a learning disability and autistic people experience greater health inequalities than the general population dying on average 20-25 years earlier and struggle to access many health and social services due to the lack of reasonable adjustments.

“We hope this new co-produced strategic plan will work towards making positive change, to enable the delivery of whole person care and interventions which are reasonably adjusted and person-centred."

Mersey Care worked with those who had accessed our services and their families and both current and former staff who had worked in these services to develop a plan to improve the care provided and opportunities for employment and training. It was co-written and co-produced with people with lived experience of autism and learning disability.

The new strategic plan has set goals to improve outcomes for people with a learning disability and autistic people by:

• Reducing health inequalities
• Improving staff training to understand the needs of autistic people and people with a learning disability
• Make sure people have a choice and a voice in their care
• Provide good quality services in the community and hospitals
• Provide care and treatment, which is reasonably adjusted and person-centred, in the best places which promote good health and wellbeing
• Services users, families and carers becoming actively involved in the shaping of service through co-production
• Set a leading example in research and innovation for learning disability and autism services.

Mersey Care’s commitment to improving their learning disability and autism services started in 2023 when they introduced several measures, including:

• Identifying Neurodiverse/Neurodivergent champions (formerly autism champions) and learning disability champions within the teams
• Using ‘Ask, Listen, Do’ - an NHS England programme which focusses on making it easier to give feedback, raise complaints or concerns about their health and, social or educational care – within services
• Checked our work with the Green Light Toolkit, which aims to improve mental health support for patients with learning disabilities
• Looking into how young people move to adult services
• Developed a learning disability and autism resources hub for staff
• Rolled out training on learning disability awareness (e-learning),
• Rolled out autism awareness and reasonable adjustments training
• Began process of refreshing the trust learning disability awareness training

The Trust is committed to co-production, with the plan and the delivery of the priorities and goals reviewed and monitored by the learning disability and autism co-production group, which consists of members who helped to write the plan and those who are keen to support Mersey Care meet its priorities.