Category Archives: Newsletters

Parent Participation Service

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The Parent Participation service recognizes the importance of designing services with parents using their voice and the skills of practitioners together to improve services. We understand the vital role that parents have in creating improved outcomes for children and families. We are here to support parents to influence the activities of the Children and Young People’s Strategic Partnership (CYPSP) and to support service providers to develop and improve co-production practice with parents for more information visit https://www.ci-ni.org.uk/welcome-to-parent-participation-service/ 

Poverty and Infant Mental Health

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The NI Association for Infant Mental Health (AIMH NI), Stronger From the Start Alliance and AIMH UK cordially invite you to attend our online Infant Mental Health Awareness Week conference on how poverty impacts the social and emotional development of infants and their relationships with caregivers:

Poverty & Infant Mental Health: 

Understanding the Relationship, Challenging the Status Quo

Friday 17th June 2022

9.30am-1.00pm 

With 1 in 4 children in Northern Ireland living in poverty and rates of poverty increasing most significantly for families where the youngest child is under one year old, we ask: Is anyone holding baby in mind?

Keynote speaker, Robin Balbernie, Child Psychotherapist and Infant Mental Health Specialist, will be joined by parents, practitioners and policy makers, to discuss the key issues and focus on ‘what works’ solutions to ensure every child in Northern Ireland gets the best start in life.

Local contributors include:

  • Parents & Practitioners from ABC PiP, MAS Project and STEP
  • Dr. Ciara Fitzpatrick, Ulster University
  • Peter Toogood, Department of Health
  • Tracy Johnston, Department for Communities
  • Linsey Farrell, Department of Education
  • Maurice Meehan, PHA

For further information and to receive the Zoom joining details, please register your attendance on Eventbrite: AIMH NI and Stronger From The Start Event – #IMHAW2022 Tickets, Fri 17 Jun 2022 at 09:30 | Eventbrite

This event is being held as part of Infant Mental Health Awareness Week 2022 and we’d be hugely grateful if you can support our awareness raising efforts by sharing this invitation across your networks.

Introducing AUTISM CONNECT!

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Introducing AUTISM CONNECT!

 

Bolster are excited to launch our brand new service…

AUTISM CONNECT is a person-centred social hub, a safe, creative space for adults with a diagnosis of autism only or awaiting a diagnosis.

Why are we launching this service?

 

In March 2020, the Southern Health and Social Care Trust commissioned  Bolster Community to co-ordinate a consultation to gain a depth of understanding of the wider social issues relating to autism in adulthood. A series of consultation events ran over twelve months and culminated in the Being Awesome (Autism and Adulthood 2021) conference in March 2021.

Here is a link to this Report: https://bolstercommunity.org/…/being-awesome-report….

 

Over 700 people with Autism along with parents, carers and professionals participated in the consultation and three clear overarching recommendations emerged:

  1. Community based autism support services focused on adults are urgently needed
  2. A distinct service grounded in the social model of health is needed for adults with autism but without a learning disability or mental health diagnosis and
  3. Support pathways -where navigators can co-ordinate and proactively share information, and provide highly responsive, individualised intervention to strengthen social connections within a community context in the Southern Trust area.

 

In response to the consultation recommendations, we’ve launched Autism Connect- a community-based support service that will provide a signposting, navigation and social opportunities for adults with an autism only diagnosis.  Would you like more information about this service? Contact Jena at jena@bolstercommunity.org