Residential Assessment Centre

Clannad: Orpington, Kent. This unit specialises in working with young people of both gender in crisis and who have complex need and require assessment as part of their placement plan.for a short period within a Residentail envirnoment.

The crisis element may be as a result of a placement or family unit breaking down where a key part of this is caused by difficult to manage behavior, or where there is intractable and unacceptable behavior, which is likely to precipitate a breakdown in the family or a foster placement.

A comprehensive Assessment is undertaken prior to and during early stages of placement refining and clarifying the needs of each child. This Assessment is reviewed regularly and updated as there is progress and further needs become apparent.

Assessments and initial Interventions can normally be delivered within a short timescale (6-16 weeks.)

At Clannad we have adopted The Pillars of Parenting 'Authentic Warmth' model of child care. This systematic approach provides a powerful Framework for assessing and identifying previously unmet or undiagnosed needs through the supervised application of Psychology within a residential environment.

Clannad accommodates young people diagnosed with emotional and social behaviour difficulties as a primary care need and / or mild learning disabilities who may also have associated complex care needs, for instance due to epilepsy, who for a variety of reasons, cannot be cared for by their own family. Our overall purpose is to provide assessment and short-term placement for such young person's that where possible mirrors the experiences and values of 'ordinary family life'.

Each assessment is carefully designed and developed by our clinical teams who provide weekly consultations with our practitioners to deliver strategies to intervene in patterns of behaviour. This expert clinical oversight is provided via external chartered psychologists, their findings can be applied whilst developing care plans for each child or young person. These strategies will reflect an intensive problem focused assessment of behavioural problems, a hypothesis for the underlying emotional causes and a proposed treatment strategy for both the short and longer term.

Following our 16 week assessment programme young people are able move onto longer term placements ranging from 2:1 intensive residential to Group Living Residential, Foster Placements or returning to their previous carers or other placement.

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