Safeguarding Children, Young People and Vulnerable Adults: Duties of Learning Disability Nurse

This essay discusses the concept of safeguarding and its application in health and social care. It highlights the duties of a learning disability nurse in safeguarding vulnerable populations and suggests actions guided by safeguarding procedures. The essay also discusses the long-term effects of abuse and the importance of partnership working in safeguarding.

(Safeguarding Children,
Young People and
Vulnerable Adults)
CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION......................................................................................................................1
TASK – 1 (ESSAY)...................................................................................................................1
TASK – 2 (SCENARIO)............................................................................................................2
CONCLUSION..........................................................................................................................4
REFERENCES...........................................................................................................................5

INTRODUCTION
The main aim of the current essay is to comprehend the concept in relation with
safeguarding and applying it on the health and social care. There are large number of people
are who mostly at the risk of getting abuse and are being referred as the vulnerable population
(Frost and Robinson, 2017). This safeguarding children, young people and vulnerable adults’
assignment will highlight the duties related to learning disability nurse related to safeguarding
and will focus on the factors that might act as a cause of concern. The essay will also suggest
the actions that can be guided by safeguarding procedure and will discuss the manner in
which partnership working can be involved.
TASK – 1 (ESSAY)
Safeguarding is referred as the protection of the health, well-being and development
of individuals and making sure that they get safe as well as effective care. There are many
different factors being included in safeguarding. The major one among them is circumstances
of the family. When looking at the parents of the children, the health of those who are in
charge of the young children and vulnerable adults is a crucial factor while considering the
well-being of the children, young people and vulnerable adults. Carer who are suffering from
their own health issues might faces problems in caring for their own children. In addition to
this, safeguarding is a broad term which also covers the principles in relation with the child
protection which involves protection of the welfare of the children from the sexual, physical
and mental abuse (Jenkins and Davies, 2018). Moreover, safeguarding protects the welfare of
every individual child, young people and vulnerable adults and also supports them in their
life skills and ensures that all vulnerable people are healthy to evolve to where they should
go. Thus, it can be said that safeguarding is not just emphasize only on abuse of the child like
protection of the child. Rather it is actual ensuring that each and every child, young people
and vulnerable adults can reach their potential, meanwhile keeping them safe and secure.
Talking in relation with the duties of learning disability nurse in safeguarding
children, young people and vulnerable adults, it can be attributed that, there are different
accountabilities and duties that the learning disability nurse is obliged to follow. Because in
the present times, there has been augmentation in the vulnerabilities in the clients for
different reasons, there is a requirement on the part of the disability nurse to be continuously
observant. One of the most crucial duties of the nurse is nothing but to empower the service
users and enhance access to advocacy. They are regarded as the positive manner of protecting
them from any sort of abuse (Davies and Ward, 2021). Furthermore, it is also essential that
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the learning disability nurse should also comprehend the accountabilities and thresholds of
abuse, along with the probable requirement to whistle blow for the protection of the service
uses from the following consequences. Other than this, it is also crucial that the learning
disability nurse should work hard for offering specialist healthcare as well as support to the
people with disability and any form of vulnerabilities, to their families and staff teams, for
supporting them to live a satisfying life. Finally, it is also crucial that the learning disability
nurse must word hard to make improvement or maintain the mental as well as physical health
of the service uses and must reduce the barriers to them living an independent life. A nurse is
also obliged to help the person to reach their full potential.
Significant harm in the context of safeguarding is defined as emotional harm being
suffered by the children who witness domestic violence or have knowledge as well as
understanding in regards with domestic violence within their home environment
(Mandelstam, 2018). There is no complete standards om which one can depend when making
judgement as to what comprises significant harm. Consideration of the harshness of ill
treatment might encompass the amount and the degree of physical harm, the amount of
premeditation, the level of coercion and threats, the time period and occurrence of abuse,
indication of unusual components in child sexual abuse, indication of sadness and bizarre.
The components being defined above has been related with more severe impact on the child,
young people and vulnerable adults and relatively greater difficulty in supporting them in
overcoming the negative influence of the ill-treatment. Many a times, an individual traumatic
happening might also result into significant harm. Furthermore, in some other situations or
conditions, significant harm is being caused due to cumulative impact of important
happenings, both long standing and acute or the destructive influence of abandonment which
disturb as well as alter or destroy the physical along with psychological development of
children, young people and vulnerable adults (Afifi and et.al, 2016).
TASK – 2 (SCENARIO)
1. As per the case, Beko remain quiet and does not mingle with other fellows in the class.
Additionally, he also pushed and hit another child quite badly and such type of behaviour
clearly evidence that there might be some cause of concern. In addition to this, the bruises
that Adam witness on the neck of Beko indicates different possible signs, symptoms and
indicators and these are as follows:
 Physical abuse – This is the easiest way of spotting any abuse as it leaves physical
marks on the childlike, burns, cuts, bruises and so forth. Nevertheless, it is crucial
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that the learning disability nurse should be aware that children are very clumsy and
most of the bruises that children will get comprises no foul play.
 Emotional abuse – This is the condition where the children are bullied by their
friends, parents and guardians verbally. This type if bullying can be related to
discrimination, racism and homophobic. In such type of abuse, child loses its self-
esteem and confidence and does not like to work in group (McGrath, 2016).
 Sexual abuse – This might take place at any age and is being performed by adult or
another child. This involve touching the child in appropriately or having sexual
intercourse. It is quite hard to identify however some might reflect some physical
signs such as bruising, pregnancy in case of girls and boy might be sacred of other
males.
 Neglect – It is also another sign that might be watched for carefully by Adam. If
the child does not care for something, these are the signs of neglect.
2. As it has been evaluated that Beko might be accused of physical, emotional and sexual
abuse, there are varied long term effect of these possible abuses on Beko. It might impact
the overall physical as well as metal health of the Beko and might lead to increase in the
risk related to depression, post-traumatic stress disorder, anxiety and he might also suffer
from high blood pressure and sleep disorder in the future. Other than this, physical, neglect
and other type of sexual abuse might be linked to higher risk for a variety of long-term
health issues such as diabetes, lungs disease, malnutrition, arthritis, heart attack, functional
limitations and damage of brain (Rosen and et.al, 2018).
3. Since, Adam is suspicion that the Beko is being physical, emotionally or sexually abused
and he is not sure that he is being abused, it is important to consider the following actions
as per the safeguarding procedure:
 Comprehending the roles and accountabilities and noticing the sign of physical as
well as emotional abuse on the Beko’s skin and other parts of the body
 He is responsible to observe the change in the behaviour of Beko and ask other
staff members about his activities and behaviour
 Adam is also required to listen and ask him what had happened carefully and must
reassure him (Peterson, Florence and Klevens, 2018)
 Adam is also required to follow the legislation, policies and procedures such as
Local Safeguarding Children Board which helps in promoting the welfare of the
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children and young people in the areas along with different acts such as The
Children Act 1989, The Children and Social Work Act 2017, Keeping Children
Safe in Education 2019, The Education Act 2002, the Human Rights Act 1998 and
The Children and Families Act 2014. All these above defined acts are established
for safeguarding children and covers the fundamental aspect of childcare and
education.
 Must follow and maintain accurate written reports encompassing date and time of
communication.
 Adam must also consider the procedure for sharing data on disclosure and actual
evidence
4. Partnership working in relation with safeguarding and taking forward the case of Beko
involves working with other agencies or firms and sharing data to them suitably when
required. There are different agencies that is required to be work together to safeguard the
interest of Beko such as teachers, doctors and police. It is crucial that all these agencies
must interact with each other adequately for making sure that protection along with safety
of the child in concern (Yang and et.al, 2018). In Beko’s case, firstly a health visitor can
be contacted as they regularly contact and meet children and then a doctor might be called
for detecting injuries and the findings then can be reported to police.
CONCLUSION
Thus, from the above analysis, it can be concluded that there are some groups of
people such as children, young people and vulnerable adults who are at high risk of getting
sexually, mentally and physically abuse. It is the duty of the learning disability nurse to
safeguard the interest of these vulnerable people by making sure safe and secure
environment. Different policies and practices have also been designed in this regard and were
identified in this essay.
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REFERENCES
Books and journals
Afifi, T.O., MacMillan, H.L., Boyle, M., Cheung, K., Taillieu, T., Turner, S. and Sareen, J.,
2016. Child abuse and physical health in adulthood. Health Reports. 27. pp.10–18.
Davies, C. and Ward, H., 2021. Safeguarding children across services: Messages from
research. Jessica Kingsley Publishers.
Frost, N. and Robinson, M., 2017. Joining up children's services: safeguarding children in
multi? disciplinary teams. Child Abuse Review. 16(3). pp.184-199.
Jenkins, R. and Davies, R., 2018. Safeguarding people with learning disabilities. Learning
Disability Practice. 14(1). pp.32-39.
Mandelstam, M., 2018. Safeguarding vulnerable adults and the law. Jessica Kingsley
Publishers.
McGrath, M., 2016. School Bullying: Tools for Avoiding Harm and Liability. Thousand
Oaks, Calif: Corwin Press.
Peterson, C., Florence, C. and Klevens, J., 2018. The economic burden of child maltreatment
in the United States, 2015. Child Abuse & Neglect. 86. pp.178–183.
Rosen, A.L., Handley, E.D., Cicchetti, D. and Rogosch, F.C., 2018. The impact of patterns of
trauma exposure among low-income children with and without histories of child
maltreatment. Child Abuse & Neglect. 80. pp.301–311.
Yang, M., Font, S.A., Ketchum, M. and Kim, Y.K., 2018. Intergenerational transmission of
child abuse and neglect: Effects of maltreatment type and depressive symptoms.
Children and Youth Services Review. 91. pp.364–371.
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