Some useful terms in the autism world

Police Passport
A police passport is a document ensure that if police are called out to support you or your child/patient they will be aware of you/your Childs autism and so not do things to escalate eg touch someone oversensitive to touch.
Find out more here: www.bristolautismsupport.org/police-passports

Hospital Passport
This is a short 2-4 page document designed to help autistic people to communicate their needs to doctors, nurses and other healthcare professionals: such as their sensory needs, their communication needs, and how they express pain.
Find out more here: www.bristolautismsupport.org/hospital-passports

Peer Mentoring
Peer mentoring is where another autistic person provides mentoring support. This can be highly beneficial as interacting with another autistic person who understands you/your child’s perspective can help you feel understood, validated, help with emotional processing, develop sensory strategies, and help break down some of the mistrust that may have been built around interacting with other people due to bullying and past abuse.

Social Prescribing
Social Prescribing is where a professional will go to social events with an autistic person or help them problem solve around attending an event or social situation.

The Special Educational Needs and Disabilities Information Advice and Support Services (SENDIAS)
This is a service every area has that can give you support with talking to school, professionals, filling out forms, EHCP process, etc
Bristol’s is: www.sendandyou.org.uk

Education, Health, and Care Plan (EHCP)
A document for anyone up to 25 years old with additional education needs that outlines what a local authority are legally required to do to meet their education, health and care needs. Click here for the beginners guide to EHCPs.

EHCP Needs Assessement
This is an initial assessment to determine if a child or young person needs an EHCP. You can apply to have one of these yourself.

Positive Behavioural Support Plan (PBS)
This document is usually for someone with a learning disability that seeks to outline who they are and what actions have been successful in reducing their distress and increasing their quality of life.

Sensory Assessment
This is an assessment of an autistic person’s sensory sensitivities carried out by a specialist occupational therapist. They come in different levels, with Level 3 covering proprioceptive needs (physical behaviours), nociceptive (differences in pain processing), and interoceptive needs (sleep, eating, toileting issues).

Communication Plan
This document is usually made by a speech and language therapist, that outlines someone’s communication needs.

Care, Education, & Treatment Reviews (C(E)TR)
This is a meeting by all professionals involved in a person’s treatment, including NHS commissioners, learning disability nurses, and an autistic expert by experience, to review an autistic or learning-disabled person’s care and treatment with the aim of preventing or reducing hospital admission. Click here for more on CETR.

Dynamic Risk Register
This is a national register that the NHS is legally required to maintain, for all autistic and learning-disabled people who might present to mental health services or be at risk of future hospital admission. It usually has a needs-based traffic light system and schemes differ across areas.

Annual Health Check
This is a yearly health check, given to those with learning disabilities, and carried out by a GP. Its aim is to reduce the significant early mortality rates learning disabled people have due to unidentified or unaddressed physical health conditions.

Health Action Plan
This is a document that contains all information about an autistic or learning-disabled person’s physical health. It is designed to allow care staff to look in one place to find out about how health conditions are being addressed and so, address the significant early mortality rates autistic and learning-disabled people have due to unidentified or unaddressed physical health conditions.

Local Offer
The Local Offer is an information directory that each local authority legally has to display to let parents of children with additional education needs know where to go for support.
Bristol’s local offer can be found here: www.bristol.gov.uk/bristol-local-offer

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