Background: The term "intellectual disability" is increasingly used to refer to people with learning disabilities in British learning disability policy, practice and research. This change is undoubtedly a reflection of the changing international context. The inclusion of the term "intellectual disability" has been particularly…

Background: Dementia prevalence rates are higher amongst people with learning disabilities than the general population. People with Down's syndrome are at even greater risk of developing dementia and of developing dementia at an earlier age. This study, conducted as part of a wider service evaluation, explored community learning disability team…

Background: Following scandals such as Winterbourne view, Department of Health, (A national response to Winterbourne View Hospital, 2012) seeks changes in challenging behaviour services. A key part of this change is ensuring people with learning disabilities who use challenging behaviour services have more personalised support and their voices are…

The Confident Parenting group is a therapeutic group for parents of children with learning disabilities and challenging behaviour, which is informed by the principles of behavioural theory and acceptance and commitment therapy. Parent's experiences of the group were elicited through participation in a large focus group which followed a…

UK National Autism Strategy (Department of Health, 2010 and National Institute for Health and Care Excellence guidance (NICE, 2012) states that frontline staff should have a good understanding of Autism. Fifty-six clinical and administrative staff from a multidisciplinary community Learning Disability service completed an electronic questionnaire…

The importance of making research participation accessible for people with learning disabilities is emphasised in government and NHS research strategies. This evaluation explored the realities of this goal from the perceptions of people with learning disabilities and clinicians within an NHS learning disability service. People with learning…

At least 20-30% of offenders within the criminal justice system (CJS) have learning disabilities or difficulties. This creates significant challenges in relation to meeting their information needs about rights, entitlements, processes and procedures. We report a pilot project where widgit Symbols were used to create more accessible information…

This article describes a partnership research project carried out by a research team consisting of people with learning disabilities and people without learning disabilities. The research explored people's understandings of advocacy and identified gaps in advocacy provision for people with learning disabilities and their families. Four focus…

People with learning disabilities have fewer choice opportunities than the general population. Existing research provides some insight, but the choice-making experiences of those who do not always utilise available healthcare remains under-explored. This research explored the choice-making experiences of two groups of individuals with a learning…

This study explores the perceptions of support workers working with adults with learning/intellectual disabilities, training and support needs. Data was collected by focus group (n = 3) and semi-structured interviews (n = 5). Participants saw their key role as maximising quality of life, identified "Trial and error" as the main mode of skill…

This paper reports on research that illuminates how people with a learning disability understand dementia and indicates the implications of these understandings for developing appropriate models of care. As this new policy and practice area struggles to provide appropriate and effective models of care for people with a learning disability and…

Here we describe the process by which research questions were developed for reducing health risks for people with learning disabilities. A participatory approach was used to give service users and carers a clear voice in "deciding" questions, thereby setting the research agenda. Audio-taped interviews and focus groups were used. Forty people (20…