Live well

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For people with Learning Disabilities, their families and carers

Living well means looking after your health before anything goes wrong, as well as seeking help when something doesn’t seem right, illness strikes or you need to go into hospital. The Equality Act 2010 says all health and care organisations must make changes to their services so they can be accessible to people with disabilities, and by 31 March 2024, a new marker will be added to everyone's healthcare record to show what disabilties they have so that Reasonable Adjustments can be made for them. This includes people with a physical disability or a sensory disability, people with a learning disability or autistic people and people with a long term condition such as dementia.

Reasonable adjustments can sometimes be small changes such as:

· Providing information in an easy read format

· Installing a ramp

· Providing a quiet room for people to wait in

· Providing a longer appointment time

Reasonable adjustments can also be quite complicated to arrange and sometimes need lots of planning across health and care teams for people who have complex needs.

Reasonable adjustments are individual and should be tailored to the person.

It’s really important to speak to your health and care professionals and tell them about the reasonable adjustments you may or your loved one may need.

We have developed a range of resources to support people with a learning disability and autistic people to help communicate what reasonable adjustments they might need to their health or care professionals. They include:

· Hospital Passport

· Coming to hospital for an appointment

· Annual Health Checks & Health Action Plans

· Easy read leaflets about your blood pressure, diabetes, cancer etc

· Reasonable Adjustments Easy Read

With acknowledgements to our colleagues at North East and Cumbria Learning Disabilities Network.

These resources and the ones below are designed to help people take care of themselves, and for their carers and the professionals who look after them.

What is Covid, post Covid and Long Covid - BTM Projects - Resources about Covid and Long Covid from our Health and Care Champions and BTM

Cervical screening guide EasyRead

What is diabetes? Easy Read

What to do when you have diabetes Easy Read

EasyRead - Carbohydrates

EasyRead about sugar

EasyRead check your blood pressure

Cervical screening large print

Cervical screening EasyRead

3 questions for better health (EasyRead)

Getting ready for a talk about your health (EasyRead)