St. John of God Community Mental Health Services is committed to creating a neurodivergent inclusive environment at Lucena Clinic Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service (CAMHS). We were awarded funding from the St. John of God Hospitaller Services Group and a grant from the St. John of God Better Life programme in 2023, in support of our project ‘Extending Hospitality to the Neurodivergent Community’. The project aims to extend hospitality to neurodivergent service users and families and to improve the experience and engagement of all those involved in the service.

Critical to the success of the project is collaboration and consultation with the young people who use our service, their families, our staff across all departments, and the wider neurodivergent community including the organisations AsIAm, ADHD Ireland and the National Adult Literacy Agency (NALA). We have taken important first steps by implementing several recommended universal accessibility measures guided by a comprehensive sensory environmental audit conducted by AsIAm, Ireland’s autism charity.

The project encompasses six key components: a sensory and environmental audit, an evaluation of written communication, consultation with service users, staff training, a roadmap report, and a blueprint for creating an autistic and neurodivergent-friendly environment in other service settings.

Examples of what we have been working on include: focus groups with adolescent service users, neuroaffirmative staff training with AsIAm, ADHD Ireland and the National Adult Literacy Agency (NALA), a new website with virtual video tours, updated Google map links, improved communication letters with help from NALA, a new wayfinding system, sensory regulation kits in all clinic offices and a charter of inclusion.

The project is an ongoing journey, and we will continue to work towards achieving our medium and long-term goals. A very important milestone was achieved when we were accredited by AsIAm as Autism-Friendly in July 2024. The accreditation was based on the work done to date and a commitment to continuing the work outlined in our charter of inclusion.