Make change happen in people's lives - use positive behaviour support
Positive behaviour support approaches have become established as the preferred approach when working with people with learning disabilities who exhibit behaviours described as challenging.
This is now reflected in a significant body of authoritative guidance, including Positive and Proactive Care: reducing the need for restrictive interventions. (Department of Health 2014) British Psychological Society’s Guidelines (Baileral 2004), and the Joint Guidelines of the Royal College of Psychiatrists, the British Psychological Society and the Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists (2007).
The strengths and successes of positive behaviour support approaches provide the reason for the increasing support for their use. They are fundamentally rooted in person centred values, aiming to enhance community presence, increasing personal skills and competence and placing emphasis on respect for the individual being supported.
They also use quality of life improvements for the person, both as an intervention and as an outcome measure.
Reducing the use of restrictive practices
Around half of all people with learning disabilities and challenging behaviour are subject to physical interventions.
The right policies and practice, and high quality training to increase staff skills and confidence and reduce injuries, is therefore critical. Much has been achieved by BILD’s work in this area over the last 10 years through the BILD Code of Practice and the BILD Accreditation Scheme >
BILD also works with organisations in building training and development networks that give constant positive behaviour support, rather than just responding to incidents with physical intervention.
This is vital for people who may experience difficulties in communicating or managing their emotions and use behaviour as a way to express themselves.
BILD's PBS work
In 2009, we set out our Positive Behaviour Support Mission to challenge the misuse of restrictive practices including the use of seclusion, time out and mechanical restraint when supporting people whose behaviour organisations find challenging. If you'd like to show your support for this approach, please sign up to it >
BILD has a number of key PBS publications, among them: the fourth edition of the BILD Code of Practice for minimising the use of restrictive physical interventions: planning, developing and delivering training, which sees a major revision of this key publication, and Framework for reducing restrictive practices by Sharon Paley-Wakefield. Find out more about BILD's PBS publications >
Our PBS journal, the International Journal of Positive Behavioural Support is playing a leading role in defining what is, and isn't PBS, which is crucial for individuals, families and commissioners, as well as services themselves. Find out more >
We run a series of events designed to spread good practice in this area, including our annual BILD Positive Behaviour Support International Research and Practice Conference each May, the most important event about PBS in the UK each year. Find out more about BILD's PBS events here >
Each year we award the BILD Positive Behaviour Leadership Awards, recognising and celebrating good practice in the field of Positive Behaviour Support. More about the 2015 winners and how to make nominations for the 2016 awards here >
We also campaign against the use of seclusion, and the misuse of ‘time out’ and mechanical restraint.
In all our work in this area, our aim is achieving positive and substantial change in the lives of vulnerable people and their families.
The Centre for the Advancement of Positive Behaviour Support
To lead on our work in this area, and to facilitate the sharing of PBS research and practice across both international boundaries and between academics and practitioners, we created the Centre for the Advancement of PBS at BILD.
Find out more about the Centre here >
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