News

The Trust was proud to support Learning Disability Week 2025 last week.

The theme this year is 'Do you see me?'. The aim is for people with a learning disability to be seen, heard, and valued.

Last week, our Primary Care Learning Disability Liaison Team went to community hospitals throughout Cornwall. They met with district nurse teams to talk about learning disabilities and how they can raise awareness.

They also made themselves available for staff to drop-in and talk through what they do.

They met other healthcare partnerships and teams for a chat too.

Samantha Maddern is the lead primary care liaison and screening liaison nurse for adults with a learning disability in Cornwall.

"We know that people with a learning disability experience poorer physical and mental health.

"We know that poor quality healthcare leads to avoidable deaths in our client group. We talk about things like reasonable adjustments. Really raising that profile.

"We know that adjustments are key in helping patients. To access healthcare in a timely manner."

Raising awareness is key. It helps colleagues and the public understand problems people with learning disabilities are faced with.

"A big part of our role is to support GP surgeries. To validate their learning disability registers.

"That's really important. It's moving away from a learning disability diagnosis. It's based now on need and vulnerabilities.

"It helps capture some of the most vulnerable people in our society. Without being identified, they may fall through the net. Or they may not be open to services they need." Samantha Maddern

Our Primary Care Learning Disability Liaison Team consists of 5 qualified nurses. They are made up of 2 roles. There are 3 primary care liaison nurses. They cover 53 GP surgeries.

The team work with adults from 18 years old and above. They support with learning disability annual health checks. They can also help with validation of GP learning disability registers. Support is also given for training for primary care staff. There is also support with reasonable adjustments. Support with capacity assessments and best interests meeting is also given. The team can also offer advice and guidance.

The other part to the team is made up of 2 screening liaison nurses. They support with the uptake of the 5 national screening programmes. They are breast, bowel, diabetic retinal, abdominal aortic aneurysm, and cervical.

The team also helps services become accessible. They help people with learning disabilities to access screening services. They aim to change attitudes. This can be for best interest decision making. They also train and support health care professionals and other workers. The team can also support other services nationally.

"Annual health checks are key in identifying unmet health needs in our client group.

"This year we achieved 80% of learning disability annual health checks. This means 80% of people with a learning disability in Cornwall have received a learning disability annual health check.

"They also lead to earlier diagnosis. This leads to better treatment outcomes within Cornwall.

"The team have worked really hard to do this. We are still striving to achieve better statistics. As well as better quality annual health checks." Samantha Maddern

Chief Executive Officer Debbie Richards is endorsing the importance of this work:

"As the chief executive lead for learning disabilities for the south west region, I am particularly pleased to see the energy and inspiration that our colleagues are bringing to this vital programme.

"We know that working together with our most vulnerable residents in their communities can help people overcome barriers and fears, improving access and most importantly their health outcomes."