Department of Health calls for views on healthcare for people with learning disabilities

The Department of Health (DH) is seeking the views and stories of healthcare from people with learning disabilities and family carers.

DH is currently writing another progress report on Six Lives about people with learning disabilities’ experiences of healthcare in the NHS in the past 12 months. As part of this, a survey has been compiled to gain the views of interested parties.

The original Six Lives report was published in March 2009 by the Local Government Ombudsman, detailing failings in healthcare for people with learning disabilities and making recommendations for improvements. This in itself was a response to the 2007 Mencap report Death by Indifference, which highlighted the cases of 6 people with learning disabilities who died in NHS or local authority care.

In its first progress report in 2010, the DH found that care for people with learning disabilities had improved in the 18 months since Six Lives was published, but that more needed to be done.

DH will use the results of this survey in its second progress report on Six Lives, which is scheduled to be published in June.

The survey takes about 10 minutes to complete. There is an easy read and a family version of the survey at: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/sixlives

The survey closes at 12am on April 15.

LDT Editor

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