Trauma and Intellectual Disability

This book is about Trauma-Informed Care (TIC) for people who have intellectual disabilities (ID). The provision of health and social care services is becoming more trauma informed, including in services for people with ID, where the experience of trauma is being increasingly acknowledged. This book addresses a gap in resources to guide those supporting people with ID by showing how services can work in a trauma informed way. Including contributions from authoritative professionals in the field, and a powerful account of abuse from an expert by experience, the book provides an overview of the history which underpins the importance of trauma and TIC, and the impact of trauma on people who have ID. The second part of the book looks at trauma informed services and a growing and diverse range of therapeutic interventions, including positive behavioural support, intensive interaction, cognitive behavioural psychotherapy, dyadic interpersonal psychotherapy, developmental, and psychodynamic approaches.

Allan Skelly is the 2019-2021 Chair of the Faculty for People with Intellectual Disabilities (FPID) of the British Psychological Society (BPS) and Consultant Clinical Psychologist with Cumbria, Northumberland, Tyne & Wear NHS Foundation Trust. Allan has published articles promoting a focus on the close personal relationships of people with an intellectual disability, the heightened lifetime risk that these will be broken or strained, and how to address this in clinical work. Allan actively promotes the Trauma-Informed Care agenda and the application of Attachment Theory in doing this. Nigel Beail is a Consultant Clinical Psychologist and Professional Lead for Psychological Services for South West Yorkshire Partnership NHS Foundation Trust, and Professor of Psychology at the Clinical Psychology Unit, Department of Psychology at the University of Sheffield., UK. He is a Fellow of the British Psychological Society, a Trustee of the British Institute for Learning Disabilities, CPD Lead for the British Psychological Society's DCP Faculty for Learning Disability, former President of European Association for Mental Health in Intellectual Disability. Pat Frankish is a Clinical Psychologist and Psychotherapist with many years of experience in the field of disability, emotional development, and trauma. Her doctoral study established a method for measuring emotional developmental stages and this has now become the “Frankish Assessment of the Impact of Trauma (FAIT”). Pat is a past President of the British Psychological Society and has always maintained a strong interest in systemic effects of policy and guidelines. She continues to speak publicly and provide training for staff working at all levels of security and community provisions.