Supported Living is not about placing someone in their own house and just leaving them to get on with their lives with minimal support. Rather, it is about enabling choice, supporting decision making and risk taking but, above all, maximising personal independence through effective, person-centred support packages with staff support available at all times of the day. A Supported Living service enables the most robust support – it should not fail. This is critical for individuals who have experienced prior placement breakdown. If the housing is not right for the individual, then another house can be sourced and the support package elements – level of support, familiar staff, familiar routines – can be retained. If the support package is inadequate, the person can change support provider or type of support, but still remain living in their own home.
Supported Living maximizes aspirations. It encompasses a valuable and meaningful presence in the community – no more being “hidden away” in institutional residential homes. It means a home of your own – where you want it, be that in a town, village or in the heart of the country. It means having the support needed to achieve goals and live a fulfilling and valued life – support hours are directly related to personal needs – no more “sharing” staff time with others and having limited opportunities to be active, engaged and getting out and about. It means familiarity with your home and the team supporting you – no large staff teams, most of whom don’t know you and you don’t know – and no mazes of rooms to find confusing and disorienting.
Autism Solutions Ltd have been imaginative and innovative in working with sponsoring local authorities to enable people with very complex needs, associated with their autism, to achieve such independence in their support package. Staff teams work closely with the service user, their family, their social worker and health and other professionals, to develop guidelines which enable behaviours which would otherwise tend to lead to exclusion from such models of support, to be effectively managed for the benefit of the service user.
As a result of this individual focus, the extensive knowledge and experience of autism, and the aspirational approach adopted, individuals who had previously been excluded from other services, or been detained under the provisions of the Mental Health Act, have been enabled to live, and develop, in a relatively short period of time, a new, inclusive life in the wider community.
Above all, Supported Living means choice, empowerment and inclusion with safety, security and predictability – these are the essential elements of a person-centred approach to supporting individuals with complex needs associated with their autistic spectrum condition.
With Autism Solutions there are no barriers – we provide the individual support solutions which each person needs.
