Exploring Views and Experiences Important to Autistic People and People with Severe and Profound Learning Disabilities in Day Services: Community and Professional Perspectives

Background: Day-services provide Monday-Friday support and are often accessed by autistic people with severe or profound learning disabilities or complex needs and people with severe and profound learning disabilities. Despite their significance, day-service support standards are often poor, and services struggle to include the voices of service members in support planning and service development. Our previous research highlighted views and experiences important to members in day-services, and we suggested it was important for day-services to focus on these views and experiences in decisions made about support. We co-produced a tool, The Day-Doc, to support day-services to do this. In this paper, we describe the framework we developed for The Day-Doc to help day-services focus on views and experiences important to their members. Methods: In this study, we sought to explore the views and experiences of service members through the perspectives of community members and day-service staff. We undertook qualitative research involving interviews, workshops and focus groups with day-service staff, people with learning disabilities, autistic people, and family members. Data were analysed through Template Analysis. Results: Participants defined four strands of views and experiences: (1) Place and Planning: Referring to service members developing environmental customs, having a sense of ownership over areas, and developing fulfilling routines. (2) Being Yourself: Referring to service members feeling free to act and behave in ways important to them, and for having their views and preferences valued and responded to. (3) Rest and Stressors: Referring to situations and environments that engender experiences of stress and the practices that alleviate this. (4) Community: Referring to having valued roles within day-service communities and having a say in their priorities and aims. Conclusion: The developed framework shows potential for supporting day-services to better include the views and experiences of service members. We discuss how we aim to realise this through The Day-Doc tool.