Building a meaningful and valued life for individuals with learning disabilities requires the sustained, diligent and coordinated efforts of family members, supporters, educators and the individuals themselves. In this article, the formative childhood and adolescent experiences of two young adults with learning disabilities, leading to their…

This article is about the lived experiences and friendships of a small group of people with a learning disability who live without support in one of the most deprived areas in the UK. The findings are from an inclusive research project, that was named "Money, Friends and Making Ends Meet" and the participants who researched their own lives become…

This study explored the perspectives of people with learning disabilities on relationships and supports in the Republic of Ireland. A national research network consisting of 21 researchers with learning disabilities, 12 supporters, and 7 university researchers conducted the study. Researchers with learning disabilities and their supporters ran 16…

This article has been written by a group of persons with intellectual disability, which is called the Consultative Committee of Persons with Intellectual Disability. This group works in Malta. The article is about how we would like to live. It looks at two things: "where we would like to live" and "going out in the community". This article shows…

My name is Emma I am 28 years old and I have Down syndrome. This is an article about my story about becoming a researcher. This article has lots of photographs of me doing research. It has information about the things I did with research. It has examples of some of my research work. This article lets me share my story with other people. This…

Experiences of eight staff working with people who have a learning disability and complex mental health needs were explored by interviews and analysed using the free association narrative interview approach (Hollway & Jefferson 2000). Participants reported that organisational factors such as not having enough permanent staff and having to manage a…

People with a learning disability face a number of challenges when seeking access to hospital care which are often distinct from those faced by the general population. Numerous statistics indicative of these challenges are represented in the academic literature. Previous research has suggested several reasons for the continued existence of these…

Despite considerable achievement in inclusive research, people with intellectual disabilities have been largely excluded from the critical area of data analysis and theory development. Next to the undoubted complexity of these tasks, this can partly be attributed to higher demands of representativeness that are used to judge the validity of…

This literature review and primary qualitative research explores therapeutic role from the perspective of Community Learning Disability Nurses. Semi-structured interviews, based on Critical Incident Technique ("Psychol Bull", 51, 1954, 327), and descriptive phenomenological methodology were adopted to elicit data amenable to systematic content…

Jim Blair is the only consultant nurse working with people with learning disabilities in the country. His job helps make people better and saves money. This article shares a conversation with Jim Blair. In the conversation, Blair says he is unhappy Valuing People programme did not do as much as it could have done. Jim is worried all the changes,…

Access to learning disability services in England is often governed by eligibility criteria. A semistructured questionnaire was completed by clinical psychologists in the north-west of England about service eligibility criteria and psychologists' role within the referral process to learning disability services. The survey highlighted both…

The speech and language therapy (SLT) service in an area of northern England receives referrals of parents who have learning disabilities. The aim of this study was to identify current referral patterns and quantify the level of demand upon the SLT service from this relatively new referral population to enable to service to meet the needs of these…

Mutual Support, a model of peer support by and for people with learning difficulties, was constructed through a participatory research process. The research focussed on individual narratives from people with learning difficulties. These narratives were then brought together to form a collective model of support. This paper outlines the detailed…

This study aimed to investigate whether a 1-day training course improved support staff knowledge about bereavement and grief in people with a learning disability. A questionnaire based, mixed design was used. Forty-eight participants were randomly assigned to one of two equal groups. A staggered design allowed for group 2 to act both as a control…

Learning of a child's disability can be a difficult time for any parent. Sensitive support is critical to ensuring parents understand the nature of the disability, the prognosis and services available to them. However, where the disability is not well understood, where professionals are not well informed and where pathways of care are not…