“A Case of CASEE” - How Does Outcome Data Guide the Development of a Specialist AAC Service?

Description

The Communication Aid Service East of England (CASEE) was opened in 2016 with funding from NHS England, after it was acknowledged that no existing service was appropriately located to cover the region. As such, the service is unique in that is has been built “from the ground up” and has expanded to now include 16 members of staff from a range of professional backgrounds. Today, the service has an active caseload of over 282 adults and children across six counties.

This presentation will offer a unique perspective on the challenges of providing for such a broad and diverse catchment area and how the acquisition and analysis of data and feedback from service users and referrers has guided the development of the service and shaped how decisions have been made. For example, since its inception the service has been using the Therapy Outcome Measures for AAC (TOM AAC) with all clients in order to evidence the changes that AAC provision is making. A large dataset (n = 107) of completed pre- and post-provision TOM AAC scores will be presented and discussed, alongside geographical spread, referral trends and case examples to illustrate the ways in which we have changed and adapted our service delivery. The team will discuss what initiatives we have developed to encourage referrals and increase the efficiency of service delivery, including our assessment kit training programme for local AAC professionals.

We will show how the provision of AAC has a positive impact for individual clients and discuss how the establishment of a new service has been aided by measuring outcomes, listening to feedback and making changes in response.

Period	11 Sept 2018
Event title	Communication Matters: International Conference 2018
Event type	Conference
Location	Leeds, United KingdomShow on map
Degree of Recognition	International