Significant first step in research to make health services better with people who are neurodiverse

We’ve just published a report which we think is a significant first step in a research programme proposal which seeks to reframe service delivery towards providing more caring, compassionate and inclusive services.

Making health services better with people who are neurodiverse is an action research project with West Yorkshire and Harrogate Health and Care Partnership, co-led by our National Director Alyson McGregor and Fischer Associates’ Martin Fischer.

The project set out to gain a deeper and richer understanding of how to support the development of kinder, more compassionate and more effective health services with people who are neurodiverse.

It explored the conditions for good services with a focus on navigating:

“It’s very difficult if things change, helps to have certainty about what is going to happen, e.g. know the place, know where will sit, how you will be called, everything...”

• Making the appointment

• Before the appointment

• Reception services and waiting for an appointment

• The consultation itself

Learnings were gathered through interviews and workshops with neurodiverse young people and adults, parents and carers, as well as surveying practice staff.

Our conversations explored how general practice can be encouraged to operate in ways that uncover what is specific to any of their patients, including those who are neurodiverse.