"From managing seasonal changes to designing space so people can share with others, our approach goes beyond the boundaries of traditional care. ".

Background

For so many people with autism and associated differences the impact of the environment on each person's experience of the world can be huge. It can be the difference between coping and not coping. 

There is a direct link with poor environments leading to an over reliance on behaviours that harm - equally our experience shows good environments lead to positive well being that facilitate people to be OK to experience the wider world. 

So, what makes a good environment is subjective - like everything else we do it's about good person centred assessment based on listening, observing and understanding each person. It is then about having buildings designed to respond to the assessed need. 

Lets take an example, 

Case Study  - Joshua

Joshua is hyper sensitive to light and sound. He struggles in the summer as the light wakes him - sometimes as early as 4am. The sounds of the morning then keeps him alert. As a result he spends a lot of time with a heavy blanket over his head and when he is due to wake he is tired. 

He finds people a little overwhelming - more so when he is tired. This impacts on his ability to engage with the world and leave his bedroom. He is then anxious through the day and struggles to sleep at night until it is properly dark. During these periods he has an over reliance on repetitive self harm. 

Joshua moved in to a sound proofed apartment, with blacked out window blinds, with an artificial lighting scheme that created a phased false sunrise at 7am and a sunset at 7pm. The same time every day through out the year. This positive pattern of night & day has helped Joshua sleep better at night. When he wakes up he feels OK to to engage with people - even go out to college and try new activities. 

Joshua no longer has a reliance on self harm to manage his world - and his world incidentally is looking good!

Integrated Sensory Engagement (ISE)

A number of people have a reliance on behaviours that harm resulting from environmental factors when simple changes to an environment can make a difference. ISE is a support model created by the founders of Enhance that focusses on changing environments to make peoples' world work. 

From managing seasonal changes to designing space so people can manage sharing with others, our approach goes beyond the boundaries of traditional care.  

Building design

We take an approach to building and environmental design that incorporates a range of technologies and design. It is this combination supported by all of the best practice systems developed in the field of learning disability and autism that come together in a way that reduce harms, increase independence and can reduce the need for paid staff support.