Trauma informed approaches have not generally been made available to staff working in services supporting people with both a personality disorder and an intellectual disability. This distinctive training manual enables facilitators who already have some level of understanding of psychodynamic concepts to help support staff better understand the people they care for in the context of their histories of trauma, and their own emotional and behavioural responses. It offers professionals who are called on to support services (psychologists, psychiatrists, psychotherapists, nurses, occupational therapists, etc) a standardised way of training and educating care staff in thinking about how best to provide support and a safe and supportive service to some of the most challenging clients. In doing so, it addresses contentious and challenging issues such as the terms 'personality disorder' and 'challenging behaviour, ' the traumatised carer and the difficulties of working competently with people who have complex emotional needs. Most importantly, it improves the understanding and confidence of staff in supporting their clients. The manual provides a course of three 2 hour sessions with guide.
About the Author: Emma Rye is a consultant clinical psychologist and clinical lead for psychology in the Mental Health of Learning Disability service in Kent and Medway Partnership NHS Trust. She has worked with adults with learning disabilities ever since qualifying from the Salomons training scheme in Kent in 1994. At that time there was very limited access to any talking therapies for adults with learning disabilities. Emma has always been a passionate advocate for equality of access to psychological therapy for this client group. She has a particular interest in psychodynamic work with adults with learning. Jo Anderson is a Clinical Psychologist working in a Mental Health of Learning Disabilities Team in Kent. Her role involves the provision of individual and group psychotherapy for people with learning disabilities, running training for carers, and working systemically with families and supporters. She is also involved in the teaching for the Clinical Psychology Doctorate at Salomons, Canterbury Christ Church University. Dr Max Pickard is a consultant psychiatrist working in Kent and Medway Partnership trust in the mental health in learning disability service. He completed his specialist training in the South London Maudsley Training scheme and has worked for over ten years for this field. His special interests involve neuropsychiatric issues in people with learning disabilities, ADHD, and psychodynamic aspects of mental health care (including trauma and personality disorder), and he has developed specialist services in these areas as well as others.