New DoN clinical practice guideline on behaviours that challenge in neurorehabilitation settings: can you contribute?

The DoN is convening a guideline development group to draft clinical practice guidelines on psychological approaches to working with adults with acquired brain injury (ABI) who present behaviours that challenge in neurorehabilitation settings.

Behaviours that challenge are a common and distressing consequence of acquired brain injury (ABI) and are associated with poorer functional outcomes, increased risk of harm to self and others, increased burden on carers (including staff and family) and reduced community reintegration in the long term. Yet currently, there are no best practice guidelines to support clinicians working in neurorehabilitation settings. 

The proposed guidelines aim to fill this gap by providing best practice guidance on the most effective psychological approaches to the management of behaviours that challenge in neurorehabilitation settings that support adults with acquired brain injury (ABI). The guidelines will adopt a longitudinal approach focusing on how clinicians can support behavioural changes throughout the ABI recovery journey.

The guidelines will target adults with non-progressive ABI (mild, moderate and/or severe) who are undergoing neurorehabilitation either in acute, inpatient, forensic, residential/slow-stream or community settings; who may have comorbid physical and/or mental health needs but where the primary rehabilitation need relates to ABI.

The proposed guideline is primarily aimed at clinical/counselling psychologists working with adults with ABI in neurorehabilitation settings (including acute, inpatient, forensic, residential/slow-stream and community), but would also be relevant to other health professionals working in the above settings as well as commissioners of neurorehabilitation services.

We are looking for expressions of interest to join the following two groups:

Core guideline development group

This group will meet monthly to research and draft the clinical practice guidelines.

You will be asked to perform literature searches and draft sections of the guideline as well as review and comment on other members' drafts.

Download the Core Development Group Member role description.

Best practice consultation group

The guidelines aim to include service examples of best practices to illustrate how the guidelines can be applied in different settings.

You will be invited to provide a short summary of a service/practice example that you put in place to support the management of challenging behaviours in an ABI setting.

You may be contacted by a member of the development group for a follow-up discussion.

If selected, your service will be referenced in the clinical practice guidelines.

You will also be invited to review initial drafts of the guidelines as part of the consultation process.

Download the Best Practice Consultation Group Member role description.

How to take part

We particularly welcome expressions of interest from psychologists from minority ethnic backgrounds, and those working in acute, forensic, specialist neurobehavioural, residential/slow stream and community settings.

To submit an expression of interest, please write a short paragraph detailing your current role, contact details, a brief summary of your experience, specifying which group you would like to join and email to [email protected] by the end of Monday 26 June 2023.

You will be contacted for further discussion about the project.