Alice Waddington

Children’s CLDN, Lancashire and South Cumbria Foundation Trust

Our service supports children with moderate – severe learning disabilities and provides support around the Transforming Care Agenda, medication monitoring, health facilitation and behavioural support. We provide workshops to parents around behaviour, sensory, sleep and understanding autism.

We also support on the paediatrician led ASD diagnostic pathway and complete school and virtual observations in line with the ADOS assessment. As a service, we are constantly identifying ways to develop our service, through identifying barriers to accessing our service with parents and coming up with ways to assist. We work together as a team to develop our services and support with evidence based research, and through liaising with colleagues within the learning disability nursing field.

I am hoping to develop my leadership skills, during my time on my masters degree we learnt about change theory and I was able to put this into practice with my peers as we developed a tool which was nationally recognised.

I have a passion for learning disability nursing, and as a result I am constantly wanting to develop my practice and the services I am working within. I want to ensure I am an effective leader so that I can give the students I supervise and assess a positive experience and create future leaders as a result.

I also feel this will be a chance for me to identify ways in which I can develop the service I work in, and hopefully this programme will equip me with further tools to be able to do this confidently and effectively.