Mandalay House, our mental health rehabilitation unit in Aylesbury is looking to develop a specialist rehabilitation service for patients who have a dual diagnosis of Asperger’s Syndrome and a mental illness. The aim of this service is that a core team will support the patients to progress through the clearly defined recovery model that the unit work to with their current patients.
The core team will also be responsible for assessing a patient’s suitability for the new service, and it is hoped that once the service is fully established it will be able to accept patients from outside of Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire who will benefit from this specialist service.
The unit already has two patients who are benefiting from specialist input and Tara Butcher, Assistant Psychologist, says “working as part of a new and developing service alongside a collaborative team has been really exciting, not just for me, but for the wider team.” Tara has been working very closely with the existing patients and their families and is delighted that the feedback to date from them has been really positive. One of the patients on the unit told Tara “it is much nicer to be able to be closer to my family and I am happy with the care I am getting”
It is the ultimate aim of the unit that patients who have this dual diagnosis will, after a period of intensive and dedicated support be able to manage in a community supported living environment and alongside, more traditional success criteria this is how they know they have achieved what they know they can with this exciting new service. Dilu Henemulla, Unit Manager, Mandalay House says “this will be a challenging and motivating project and I am looking forward to the therapeutic nature that having a mix of patients on the unit will bring.”
Published: 4 January 2012