Learning disability nursing. Improving primary health care for people with learning disabilities.

'Signposts for Success' (Department of Health (DoH), 1998a) states that specialist learning disability services (SpLDS) must promote liaisons with, and offer specialist advice to, primary healthcare teams (PHCTS). With the advent primary care groups (DoH, 1998b), genuine collaboration and partnershi...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Publicado en:British Journal of Nursing Vol. 8; no. 18; pp. 1216 - 1222
Autor principal: Bollard M
Formato: tables/charts Journal Article
Publicado: Mark Allen Holdings Limited 10/14/99
Acceso en línea:Ver este registro en EBSCOhost
Descripción
Sumario:'Signposts for Success' (Department of Health (DoH), 1998a) states that specialist learning disability services (SpLDS) must promote liaisons with, and offer specialist advice to, primary healthcare teams (PHCTS). With the advent primary care groups (DoH, 1998b), genuine collaboration and partnership-forging is necessary and timely to prevent people with learning disabilities being excluded from healthcare services. The project described in the article had three broad aims: first, to establish a practice register of people with learning disabilities in all practices involved in the project; second, to enable practice nurses (PNs), with support, to carry out a systematic health check within the practice of people with learning disabilities; and third, to enable the project nurse to act as a crucial link between SpLDS and the PHCT. The health checks highlighted unmet health and social needs, which were then met through appropriate referral and intervention, mainly to specialist services. Follow ups were conducted to measure any health gain as a result of the applied interventions. Evidence of health gain was revealed, painting to the clinical effectiveness of performing such checks within the PHCTs.