Identifying an Intellectual Disability is important to a young person, their family, carers and services e.g. education, health or social care. A variety of evidence should be considered when diagnosing or formulating, with a view to creating a person-centred plan to meet a person’s needs. It is very important to be aspirational for everyone with an ID in terms of quality of life and life outcomes. Having an ID should not be seen as an impairment, nor a barrier to having a good life and a full life like everyone else.

This is a two day conference, which you can attend either of the days independly, or both of them. It is organised by the Child & Adolescent Intellectual Disability Psychiatry Network of ACAMH, known as CAIDPN.

Key learning takeaways

1. Improve knowledge of physical health in children and young people with an intellectual disability
2. Increased awareness of the roles of allied health professionals in caring for children and young people with an intellectual disability
3. To gain update on service delivery issues in working with children and young people with an intellectual disability and their families from the perspectives of national clinical director, expert by experience and lead consultants.

About the talks

Dr. Heather Hanna – Keynote: ‘CAMHS for children and young people with intellectual disability (lessons learned from Northern Ireland)’
Heather will talk about CAMHS services in Northern Ireland, and setting up Northern Ireland’s first CAMHS-ID team ten years ago. Heather views this service development as a “twenty year project” and will talk about her journey so far – sharing lessons learnt in relation to all aspects of service development. Heather started as a sole practitioner in 2014 but now works with a team of almost 15 people to provide specialist, therapeutic interventions including early group-based interventions and intensive outreach. She will share her recent experience of working with the Department of Health to help support the development of services across Northern Ireland.

Key learning outcomes

1. To understand best practice guidance in relation to community-based CAMHS-ID
2. To understand the challenges and opportunities, such as balancing innovation and governance, developing practitioner skills and working well with others.
3. To recognise the importance of focusing on the needs and rights of children, in order to improve outcomes

Dr. Carole Buckley – ‘Mum, GP, expert – how to get the best outcomes for your patients’
I am not an academic but a GP with a special interest because of my personal circumstances. My research and publications have been pragmatic, looking at diverse topics like Lithium monitoring in primary care for LD, consultation skills in autism for general practitioners, GPs confidence in autism, improving mental health in autism, and NICE guideline development in autism for adults and children, along with the NICE guidelines on Challenging behaviour and learning disability. Most recently I have been involved in a study at Newcastle university looking into the implementation of annual health checks in autism.

Key learning outcomes

1. To understand the barriers families face getting appropriate support for their special children
2. To understand how you as a professional can support these families even in the challenging times we now face
3. To ensure your research is focussed on outcomes that really matter to the families

Lauren Preece – ‘Sharing educational information, specifically assessments, with health staff’
An overview of education at Jade Unit, what we do and how we work. How we have applied the research conducted analysing accessible sharing of educational assessment and the terminology used by education with the MDT, within a tier 4 CAMHS service for children and young people who have a significant or complex learning disability.

Key learning outcomes

1. To understand more about how education works within Jade Unit
2. To understand more about the information shared between the education and health teams at Jade Unit
3. To understand how educational assessment sharing has been improved

Liz Ashby – ‘Surviving occupational stress and burnout creatively’
Liz researched burnout to inform herself and her colleagues about ways to manage their stress in the work context; she interviewed 15 art therapists across England about how they were managing in their work context, and documented their responses and strategies for self-care. She also looked into resilience and how you develop that, and all this made her very resilient!

Key learning outcomes

1. To recognise how stressed you are
2. To understand ways of managing that
3. To understand how to stay as well as possible

Dr. Georgina Parkes – ‘Inpatient challenges; findings from a retrospective study of referrals spanning over 4 years in a LD -CAMHS inpatient unit in North London’
CAMHS LD inpatient services are small and admit from all over England. This study looks at all referrals received over a four year period since Crystal House opened. Background characteristics are looked at as well as diagnosis, level of ID, how long they waited to be admitted. Whether they were admitted elsewhere. Where they went to upon discharge. Whether they were delayed discharges and if so why. Some patient examples are discussed to illustrate points. There will then be a discussion about the current national picture of CAMHS ID inpatient units.

Key learning outcomes

1. To recognise the characteristics of children who are referred to tier 4 services.
2. To understand whether there are delayed discharges and what the barriers are to discharge.
3. To understand what the current national picture is around LD CAMHS inpatient services.

Dr. Georgina Parkes – ‘Trauma in learning disabilities and autism’
When children and young people with autism and learning disabilities experience trauma how does it present in clinical settings? How can clinicians diagnose PTSD and complex PTSD when history of trauma is often absent initially? In this workshop we will discuss these and other clinical dilemmas. I will discuss cases and can offer discussion of cases brought by participants. I have experience and training in psychodynamic psychotherapy and use these insights to inform clinical practice. I currently work in an inpatient CAMHS LD setting.

Key learning outcomes

1. To recognise the impact of trauma in young people with LD and autism.
2. To be able to diagnose PTSD and complex PTSD in this group of young people.
3. To think about the impact on the clinician.

About the speakers

Dr. Ken Courtenay, is a Consultant Psychiatrist in Learning Disability. He has supported people with learning disabilities and autistic people in community services since 1998. He has recently taken on the role of National Clinical Director for Learning Disabilities and Autism. Currently, he is employed by Barnet Enfield and Haringey Mental Health NHS Trust working in offender services for people with learning disabilities. He has been the National Professional Advisor with the Care Quality Commission since 2020. Professional roles have included Chair of the Faculty of Psychiatry of Intellectual Disability with the Royal College of Psychiatrists (2018 – 2022) and President of the European Association for Mental Health and Intellectual Disabilities (2023 – 2025)

Dr. Liz Ashby, has worked as an art therapist in CWPT since 1998, in learning disabilities services and older adults.  She started her PhD after a colleague burnt out and the Trust demonstrated little understanding of the condition.  Now Liz provides teaching about the process of burnout and how to manage our own occupational stress.

Dr. Carole Buckley, Retired GP and mother of a young man with a severe learning disability, autism and epilepsy, Member RCGP SIG for Learning disability and autism. A GP for over 30 years and the mother of David, now 34, who has a severe learning disability, autism and epilepsy. Having fought for the best possible care and support for him over the years it was very clear that many in his position were not receiving the right support. This lead to roles on NICE guideline development groups, RCGP clinical champion for autism, and “the GP” at many conferences and committees over the years. I have many tales to tell and pet hates to entertain the audience with.

Lauren Preece, is a school teacher for children with SEN in a Tier 4 specialist inpatient setting. She recently completed a Masters Degree in profound and multiple learning disabilities focussing on education for children and young people who have both learning disabilities and mental illness. She is currently planning to embarking on a PhD continuing her research with a provisional focus on trauma. She has an interest in MDT working, and this is what drew her to working within a T4 service. She has completed research on sharing information between professionals within health and education settings which has enabled policy and practice changes within the setting.

Professor Caroline Richards PhD, ClinPsyD is Professor of Neurodevelopmental Conditions and Deputy Head of Education at the University of Birmingham School of Psychology. She completed her BSc in Psychology at the University of Birmingham in 2007 and completed her PhD in 2012, supervised by Professor Chris Oliver. Her PhD was in self-injurious behaviour in children and adults with autism spectrum disorder and combined large epidemiological surveys of risk markers, with single case experimental designs using fine grained behavioural observations. In 2010, alongside the completion of her PhD, Professor Richards undertook training as a Clinical Psychologist at the University of Birmingham. She completed this training in 2015, which included specialist placements conducting assessments of children ‘at risk’ of autism and a seminal meta-analytic study of autism characteristics in rare genetic syndromes. In 2015 she began her post-doctoral fellowship at the Cerebra Centre for Neurodevelopmental Disorders, leading work assessing sleep problems in children with rare genetic syndromes. In June 2017 she was appointed as Lecturer in Neurodevelopmental Disorders at the University of Birmingham and promoted to Senior Lecturer in 2020. The aim of Professor Richards’ research is to reduce negative clinical outcomes for individuals with neurodevelopmental disorders. Her work with children with autism and children with rare genetic syndromes has thus far focused on reducing self-injury, improving sleep disorders and understanding the impact of premature birth. Her research uses experimental, epidemiological, single case and meta-analytic techniques to delineate risk markers, improve precision in models of mechanism and develop novel, proactive interventions. Professor Richards collaborates with colleagues at the Cerebra Centre for Neurodevelopmental Disorders.

Dr. Georgina Parkes is a Consultant Psychiatrist at Crystal House, CAMHS ID inpatient unit, with 20 years experience working across ID services. She’s also Honorary Senior Lecturer, University of Hertfordshire, Treasurer, Institute of Psychotherapy and Disability, Executive Coach and Balint group leader. She has written about the impact of trauma in people with ID in “Treating with Respect” due 2025. Authored chapters in Intellectual Disability and Psychotherapy and DMID 2 amongst others. She has first hand experience of the challenges facing adolescents with ID who require treatment within specialist inpatient settings, discussing trends around referrals over the last 4 years.

Dr. Heather Hanna is a Consultant Child and Adolescent Psychiatrist in Intellectual Disability. She is the clinical lead for a CAMHS-ID team, based in Northern Ireland. Heather was awarded UK Psychiatrist of the Year in 2018, by the Royal College of Psychiatrists, for her role in setting up Northern Ireland’s first CAMHS-ID team. She now works with the Department of Health (NI) to address the need for service development across the region. Heather is the current chair of the Intellectual Disability Faculty of the Royal College of Psychiatrists in Northern Ireland and Vice-Chair of the Child and Adolescent Intellectual Disability Psychiatry Network. Heather has interests in service development, restraint reduction and improving outcomes for children and young people with intellectual disability.