Autism Involvement Group (AIG) – July 2019
AIG meeting held on 30th July 2019
Summary
This AIG discussions included:
Discussion of changes to AIG and APB Governance – Paul Giblin
The discussion included:
The Autism Partnership Board would stand down in the Autumn because it was not fulfilling the role it had been set up for. The discussions at the forum had been duplicating those at Autism Involvement Group (AIG) rather than being escalated with the relevant organisations. Instead the AIG would continue to have discussions and escalate them to the relevant part of the Sustainability and Transformation Partnership (STP).
Pre-diagnoses support discussion – Paul Giblin on behalf of Justin Wiggins
Pre-diagnoses support had been discussed previously at AIG, and as a result of this members felt that it was important to find out what support was available. Currently there are not any discreet pre-diagnostic autism support services. Therefore, the AIG suggested a range of universal sources potentially available, these included:
Talkworks (formally Depression and Anxiety Service).
Devon Recovery Learning Community New Leaf
CoLab Exeter
Step One
Workways
Devon Advocacy Consortium
Living Options
It was noted that:
In some circumstances Occupational Health will also refer someone for autism diagnosis or support under the Equality Act, which should then result in reasonable adjustments in their workplace.
The Children & Family Health Devon website was cited as a good source of support and it was agreed to link to their site from the DFA site.
Overall, the Dimensions for Autism (DFA) website is a core source of advice and information, the better it can become the more people will benefit when waiting for diagnoses.