Ulster Learning Disability Nurses To Share Best Practice

Nurses involved in the care of people with learning disabilities converge on the University of Ulster’s Jordanstown campus next week for the National Network for Learning Disability Nurses’ annual conference. Now in its 24th year, this is the first time the conference, which will attract learning disability nursing practitioners from all over Ireland and the UK, has been hosted by the University of Ulster.

According to Dr Owen Barr of UU’s Institute of Nursing Research & School of Nursing, the two day conference aims to promote and share best practice in learning disability nursing.

“The conference is an ideal personal development opportunity for learning disability nurses and it will give them a chance to develop networking opportunities with other nurses working in the same field of nursing.

“While the number of nurses involved in the care of people with learning disabilities is relatively small, there is a growing awareness of the specific needs of people with learning disabilities and the conference will use examples of innovative work to highlight how nurses in learning disability have positively contributed to addressing these across a range of community and residential based services.”

The conference programme includes a series of thought provoking talks and presentations which highlight the role of learning disability nurses, such as ‘Death and Dying: the development of person centred approaches to end of life care for people with learning disabilities’; ‘Best Practice Statement for Access to Health Care for People with a Learning Disability’; and ‘Dementia and People with Learning Disabilities’.