Many of our independent schools and care settings are looking to ensure that come September their ‘therapeutic’ team is in place to support the student’s therapy needs across their education and care environments.

A number of large chains have commented that they previously looked to employ therapists within the school or care setting, yet staff retention was poor using this model.

It is a known fact that therapy staff working in isolation from their therapy colleagues as part of a care or education team often stay for a short number of months, given the challenging demands of their case load.

There is an apparent increase in referrals from clients groups with Autistic Spectrum Disorders as well as Emotional and Behavioural Disorders within school and care settings. Many therapists can struggle with these client groups when working alone.

Integrated Treatment Services have experienced much greater success in settings such as these, when the therapists are contracted and co-ordinated by our independent therapy team rather than the setting itself.

The benefit of this is that the education and care setting do not need to worry about:

• Staff retention
• Continuing professional development and mentoring needs
• Annual leave, maternity leave or sick leave, as you will only pay for the therapy sessions received
• Disruptions to services, we aim to provide you with longer term therapists offering students and staff consistency
• Organising the team according to each therapist’s professional guidelines.

Our team of therapists in London and the South will allow settings to spot purchase or contract in:

• Occupational Therapists
• Speech and Language Therapists
• Physiotherapists
• Arts Therapists – music therapy, art therapy, play therapy, dance/drama therapy
• Psychological support – clinical psychologists, educational psychologists and cognitive neuro psychologists.

Our team of therapists are very much used to working together. They understand each other’s roles, how they compliment each other’s work and where they differ. Any one of our therapists in London and the South should be able to identify all of the multi disciplinary needs within a given student. This therefore makes it possible for an environmental assessment to be carried out by some of the therapy team and not others, yet a holistic picture of the therapy and psychological needs can be drawn upon.

Given the vast area within London itself and the Southern region, our therapists are happy to travel to carry out such assessments. All our therapists are linked up online to a wider geographical therapy team, making it possible for them to call upon the expertise of our therapists across the UK.
Further referrals are coming through from clusters of schools and academies who are now in more control of their own budget. We frequently hear how schools have experienced:

• Inconsistency in therapists
• Lack of specialised skills for the settings
• Funds wasted on paying for sick leave, maternity and no cover being offered

Repetitive assessment and programme setting without any demonstration of what therapy tasks actually look like, ensuring that teaching assistants can deliver these appropriately and with success.

I.T.S therapy teams can absolutely provide you something different to this. Our therapists across London, The South and the Midlands, will provide you with:

• assessment baseline information and IEP targets
• Lesson planning and differentiation to incorporate therapy into the every day opportunities.
• Consistency of one therapists visiting the school
• Ability to call upon expert skills outside of the therapists own skills
• Demonstration and joint coaching to ensure therapy material is understood
• Attendance at annual review meets and parents meetings where needed

Our therapists will aim to progress each child to the point of discharge. The students, language, phonics, cognition, speech, social communication eating and drinking are all assessed and supported.
If you are considering outsourcing you budget to an independent therapy provider, we would welcome contact from you, so that we can personalise our service to your settings needs.

Education authorities in the London boroughs, Southern counties and right throughout the Midlands have also been approaching us at the end of last term in order to meet the statemented needs of children’s statements.

Integrated Treatment Services therapists in London, the south and the Midlands are able to offer consistency to the school, teaching staff, student and their parents in order to act on behalf of the local authority to deliver their statemented therapy needs.

Our therapists are familiar with this working practice, undertaking the explicitly named therapy services within the individual’s statement and reporting back to the Local Authority at timely intervals. Local authorities who have worked with our team to date, highlight their satisfactions with the first class therapy services they have contracted. Schools and parents are placing less pressure on Local Authorities when the statemented needs are reliably met with one of our Integrated Treatment Therapists therapists.

Finally we continue to receive referrals on a daily basis from families within London and the South as well as the Midlands, who are looking to access a thorough assessment of their children’s needs plus access to immediate therapy with a consistent named therapist.

Families report that they like our team as all our therapists are very knowledgeable of the holistic needs of the child. Families start a journey with a single therapists and swap between different disciplines to suit the need of the child.

Families comments that they feel:

• fully informed about their child’s needs
• knowledgeable about the approaches which might help
• their child relates well to the I.T.S therapist given that the
• therapist is consistent and the child gets to know them well
• The therapy is fun, imaginative, changeable so the child doesn’t tire and become bored.

If you are a family looking for therapy in London, the South or the Midlands, contact us and we shall help to answer all your questions.