Restrictive Practice

Restrictive Practice

Restrictive practices often occur with people whose behaviour others find difficult or challenging.  Certainly among children and young people there are many that may be unnecessarily restrained in violation of their human rights and contrary to the best practice evidence. When we look at people living with disability, at least a quarter of all people with an intellectual disability, including young people and children, are believed to have been subject to restraint in care, including physical, chemical, mechanical restraint and seclusion (The Australian Psychological Society (APS), 2010).

Although there are many rules and laws that surround restrictive practices for adults, there are not so many that cover Children. Our practice is a firm advocate of looking for alternatives to restrictive practice. This passion rose out of our work with children living with disabilities where we noticed an astounding number of children tied to themselves or pieces of equipment for their or other’s protection. Sometimes children need to be harnessed, and it is a helpful safety precaution, but the judging factor is whether the harnessing allows them to participate fully in their activities of daily living or not. And whether the harnessing itself harms them or not.

There are often alternatives to restrictive practices and we can assist in providing training, strategies, protocols and procedures and/or alternatives for you, your child or your organisation.

According to the Victorian Disability Act 2006 restrictive practices means any intervention that is used to restrict the rights or freedom of movement of a person with a disability including –

(a) chemical restraint;

(b) mechanical restraint;

(c) seclusion.

But further to that in society we restrain people in all sorts of ways where behaviour seems difficult. At Adelaide Night and Day Family Therapy we look for alternatives to these restrictive practices to work with behaviours. We come from the perspective that behaviour has meaning and is doing something for the person or is a communication conscious or otherwise by the person who is identified as having problem behaviour. Yet even if the behaviour has meaning it may not be working for anybody in the system, so we look for solutions either where the behaviour is no longer necessary and restrictive practices are no longer considered needed, or alternatives to restrictive practices are found .

• Positive Behaviour Support Programs and Plans
• Communication Strategies
• Sensory Processing Therapies
• Behavioural Strategies

please see our Article Tied Up In Knots

Although Adelaide Night and Day Family Therapy is NDIS registered, we are not registered as behaviour support practitioners within NDIS and as such do not offer that service.

Johanna de Kort, our Principal Occupational Therapist, convened the first South Australian Conference on Restrictive Practice in 2009 and has been a guest speaker at many conferences on the subject and is a past Chair of the Australian Disability Professionals Sub Committee of Abuse and Restrictive Practices.

Brett Williams, our Principal Family Therapist, is curious about the reasons you use the methods you do for getting outcomes, keeping you and your loved ones safe, and equally curious about if that is working for you.