We are #AutismAllies.
West Yorkshire Health and Care Partnership aims to achieve a 10% reduction in the gap in life expectancy between people with mental ill-health, learning disabilities and autism/neurodiversity, and the general population by 2024. Achieving this ambition will make life better for more than 200 000 people living in West Yorkshire.
A key part of our work in 2022-2023 is an all-age neurodiversity (Autism and ADHD) deep dive across West Yorkshire. The term neurodiversity refers to the way that everyone’s brains naturally work differently from one another. Around one in seven people are neurodivergent, which means they behave, think, process, and interpret information in ways that differ to most other people. We will be working with people with lived experience and our partners across all sectors to:
- understand the current experience of users and families of Autism and ADHD services.
- map existing Autism and ADHD provision, capture data and information.
- assess initiatives and ways of working to see if these could improve how the system works and the impact on individuals and families. Identify projected future gaps and issues to address and explore options to proactively address future projected need/areas of work.
We want this review to be collaborative and inclusive with an ambition to make the best use of our collective expertise to improve services and shape the wider determinants of health; particularly addressing social inequalities faced by neurodivergent people.
Currently services for Autism and ADHD are designed and delivered in each of our places, and the deep-dive will provide the learning to help our places do this in more sustainable ways or to consider whether there are opportunities to collaborate across West Yorkshire in providing specialist support, that interfaces with strengthened primary care and local authority provision within each place.
Touchstone will be responsible for the co-production element of the project, ensuring voices from a diverse range of backgrounds and experiences are involved in every aspect of the project.