Meeting-The-Challenge-Making-a-Difference-Practitioner-Guide

Foreword
The last ten years have seen major changes in the way health and
social care services work with people with the complex psycho-social
difficulties known as personality disorder. Great strides have been
made in developing new treatment interventions to support people
in leading more fulfilling lives
At the same time, the government has
provided additional funding for
specialist and innovative services and
the publication of guidance documents
about workforce development and
commissioning of services for people
with personality disorder.
In 2003 the Department of Health
published No Longer a Diagnosis of
Exclusion, a guidance document which
highlighted the failure of mainstream
mental health services to identify and
provide appropriate treatment for those
with personality disorder or other complex
psycho- social disorders. A programme
to develop 11 community personality
disorder services was established in
2005 with the aim of testing new
service models and evaluating their
effectiveness. The majority of these
pilot services have since transferred
into mainstream local provision and
have led to steady growth in personality
disorder services across the UK.
Breaking the Cycle of Rejection:The
Personality Disorder Capabilities
Framework, published in 2004,
launched a major education and
training initiative to improve the
awareness, capability and competence
of workforces across health, social care
and criminal justice. A partnership
between the Institute for Mental
Health Nottingham, Emergence
(formerly Borderline UK), the Tavistock
and Portman NHS Trust and the Open
University established the Knowledge
and Understanding Framework (KUF)
which now offers a comprehensive
education and training programme for
staff working with people with
personality disorder.
These initiatives, supported by NICE
Guidance on Borderline and Antisocial
PD in 2009, have opened the door to
service development and most
importantly, workforce training
initiatives to ensure that services can
better provide for those with complex
psychological difficulties.
Meeting the Challenge – making a
difference serves as a companion guide
to Working with Personality Disordered
Offenders, published in 2011.This present
Guide is intended for community
practitioners, and aims to bring
up-to-date thinking about personality
disorder into the daily work of
thousands of staff working across
health and social care services. Their
committed work deserves support.
Nick Benefield,
Programme Director, Department
of Health Personality Disorder
Programme, 2004-2014
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