The Simplicitas vision is of a care service which simply puts people’s needs first. We aim to manifest hope, enjoyment and fulfilment for people whose lives have been limited by disability, trauma or mental illness, and for whom diagnosis has brought exclusion, not solutions.
We believe that our uniquely committed approach to individuals who have fallen through gaps, and continue to challenge regular mainstream service provision, brings benefits not just to those individuals, their families or their carers, but to communities and society at large.
The Model of Care used within Simplicitas is summarised below. A full version of the document is available here.
It is a humanistic, rights based, therapeutic model of care, based on the primacy of excellent relationships between people, as the most effective tool to promote change and personal growth.
The fundamental principles are :
For many people who enter services with ‘complex disability and mental health needs’, the diagnosed disability, or mental health condition, is not the whole, or even the biggest factor, in the difficulties they have faced in their lives. Many have suffered trauma either within or outside their families, and have not had the right supports in their earlier lives to deal with past trauma, and build their own positive personality and identity.
The diagnosed disability, or mental health condition is addressed through a range of clinical and medical supports, each one specifically tailored to the presenting condition. In some instances this may mean bringing in additonal treatments, or specialists. We not begin from an assumption that each person will require an exactly similar intervention. Staff are trained to understand the different facets of a range of disabilities, particularly in relation to how people process informaiton around them, as this will often condition their responses. Fundamental to all the people we work with, is that we see as our primary goal to be working with a person’s unique individuality, giving them agency in their own world and bringing them to the optimum level of independence that is right for them.
As well as being a humanistic model which believes in the inherent ability of a person to create change for themselves in their life, with the correct supports, our model is also founded on a fundamental belief in Human Rights. Basic Human Rights are universal and unconditional. As a society we are still a long way from a situation where people with disabilities or mental health conditions experience their rights as universal and unconditional. An understnading of Human Rights, and a commitment to ensuring rights are respected, and not infringed, is an essential element of our Model of Care.
Excellent relationships require an innate sense of mutual respect, and a considered approach to communication and interactions between people. Communication can best be understood as a broad range of activities, verbalisations, choices not to interact, ‘behaviours’ – both wanted and unwanted – and responses, which take place in the dynamic interactions between two or more people, and between a person and their environment. Learning to observe and pay attention to all aspects of communication enables a pathway towards better communications, increasing the likelihood that a person will be understood and get their needs met, and be recognised and validated for who they are.
People who join our services often do so in a time of crisis. Often they have experienced long periods of time in institutional, secure, or medical settings. Often they have been receiving services that have not met their needs, as a result of which services have broken down. People may come to us with a history of coping mechanisms and ways of communicating their distress and trauma which present risks to others, or to themselves. Where people use violent and aggressive, or self-injurious behaviours to fulfil this function, it is likely to take some time for them to learn new ways of expression, enabling them to let go of these props. There will inevitably be times when people are not able to maintain complete control over themselves, and part of our role will be to lend them some control until their self-control returns to them. Any kind of physical intervention, to assist people to manage behaviours, and in particular full restraint, is always a last resort, and there are many steps in prevention and de-escalation that can be taken before such a need arises. Where physical intervention has to be used to protect the safety and dignity of all involved, appropriate techniques will be applied.
In summary the model of care consists of the following elements:
This approach is underpinned by training and development of staff in the areas of:
Human Development/normal and disrupted
Therapeutic Crisis Intervention (TCI)
Transactional Analysis (TA)
Human Rights and Legal Capacity