An exploration of the Personal Relationship Advisory Group in a community learning disability service: A service development project

Abstract

Accessible summary The project aimed to explore discussions from the Personal Relationship Advisory Group (PRAG) meetings in a community adult learning disability team to influence the development of new relationship resources. All meeting minutes within a 12‐month period were analysed to find themes. The themes suggest the importance of the service looking at the whole person, such as their physical, emotional and social well‐being, when there are relationship concerns. New resources that focus on personal sexuality, different types of relationships and Internet safety may be of benefit to the service. Resources for carers may also be useful, such as helping carers to support people with learning disabilities to safely access relationships online. Abstract Background Adults with learning disabilities often face barriers when accessing relationships and can require additional support. The Personal Relationship Advisory Group (PRAG) is a provision in a community learning disability service in North England, which offers multidisciplinary advice regarding relationship concerns. The current project aimed to identify common themes within PRAG to influence the development of new resources in the service. Materials and Methods All meeting minutes within a 12‐month period were analysed using thematic analysis. There were a total of 16 minutes, which discussed 11 people with learning disabilities. This included six females and five males with a mean age of 30 (SD = 14.97). Results Individuals often had limited opportunity to develop relationships. There was a lack of understanding of sex and of how to behave appropriately in different types of relationships, with a need for individualised, accessible education. The Internet was commonly used to seek relationships, with many concerns regarding safety from carers or family. There were some unhelpful responses from others, such as the implementing of restrictions. Factors that may have an impact on the person's overall well‐being, such as their health, social issues and trauma, were often discussed. Conclusions The identified themes suggest the need for the service to take a holistic, biopsychosocial and individualised approach when supporting individuals with any relationship concerns. A multidisciplinary approach and collaboration with the individual and family/carers is key. It may be useful for the service to develop resources on topics such as personal sexuality, different types of relationships and Internet safety. Carer‐specific resources would also be beneficial, such as advice on how to safely support individuals to seek relationships on the Internet.

Empowering Young People with Special Educational Needs to Recognize and Report Child Sexual Exploitation and Abuse: A Mixed-Methods Review

“…Both raters reached the same ratings for the two independently rated studies. Eight qualitative studies were assessed as being of high quality (Bates et al, 2021;Finlay et al, 2015;Franklin & Smeaton, 2018;Franklin et al, 2019;McElearney et al, 2021;Pryde & Jahoda, 2018;Wilkinson et al, 2015), and two of moderate quality (Coleman & Sharrock, 2022;Malovic et al, 2018). The high-quality studies were observed to have clear aims and rationale for qualitative methodology, the findings were presented clearly, and the research was deemed highly valuable.…”

“…Malovic et al (2018) did not sufficiently justify the need for a qualitative methodology and was not observed to have analyzed the data rigorously. Coleman and Sharrock (2022) were not observed to have provided detailed considerations of ethical issues, and elements of the design were not adequately justified. It is also worth noting that 4 out of the 10 qualitative studies did not report on the relationship between researcher and participants (Bates et al, 2021;Franklin et al, 2019;McElearney et al, 2021;Wilkinson et al, 2015).…”

“…Six studies (Bates et al, 2021;Finlay et al, 2015;Franklin & Smeaton, 2018;Pryde & Jahoda, 2018;Wilkinson et al, 2015) used data from semi-structured interviews, two used a blend of interviews and focus groups (Franklin et al, 2019;McElearney et al, 2021), one used data extracted from textual records of professionals' meetings (Coleman & Sharrock, 2022), one (Malovic et al, 2018) used information obtained via an expert-consensus methodology, and one used online surveys (Franklin & Smeaton, 2017). Data were analyzed thematically (Bates et al, 2021;Coleman & Sharrock, 2022;Finlay et al, 2015;Franklin et al, 2019;McElearney et al, 2021), via inductive frameworks Wilkinson et al, 2015), and Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (Pryde & Jahoda, 2018; Wilkinson et al, 2015). One study (Malovic et al, 2018) described the development of a group intervention, whereby findings were largely in respect to facilitator and author reflections.…”

“…Most studies (n = 10) focused on school-aged young people (Finlay et al, 2015;Franklin & Smeaton, 2017, 2018Franklin et al, 2019;Hannah & Stagg, 2016;Malovic et al, 2018;McElearney et al, 2021;Pryde & Jahoda, 2018;Roberts et al, 2020;Wilkinson et al, 2015). Three studies focused on disabled adults, with one asking participants to recall their childhood experiences (Bates et al, 2021;Coleman & Sharrock, 2022;. A range of needs and conditions were represented, including autism (Franklin & Smeaton, 2017, 2018Hannah & Stagg, 2016;Pryde & Jahoda, 2018), intellectual disability (Bates et al, 2021;Coleman & Sharrock, 2022;Finlay et al, 2015;Franklin & Smeaton, 2017, 2018Franklin et al, 2019;Malovic et al, 2018;Pryde & Jahoda, 2018;Wilkinson et al, 2015), and disabled and/or D/deaf .…”

Working collaboratively with an online advisory group of people with learning disabilities in covid-times: carrier pigeons, cats and drones

“…The global pandemic and impacts of lockdown highlighted the importance of people with learning disabilities having access to technology and the internet [ 2 , 35 ]. Online safety has long been a concern for people with learning disabilities themselves as well as families and carers [ 36 ]. We can see this reflected in the British Journal of Learning Disabilities where two of the top five most cited articles focus on internet usage both with the terms ‘risks’ in their titles [ 37 , 38 ].…”