Positive Behaviour Support Services

Bookyana is excited to announce that we are now able to deliver culturally appropriate Positive Behaviour Services to all of our Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal participants. 

The aim of a Positive Behaviour Support Plan (PBSP) is to provide the participant with a better quality of life and to eliminate restrictive practices wherever possible. It also works to improve self-esteem and expand a participant’s social capabilities and connection to community.

Our Behaviour Support Practitioners understand that all behaviours serve a purpose, whether they are good or bad, as they are allowing a person to communicate their needs. 

What we do is look at the behaviours of concern (BoC) and work with participants, their families, providers and support workers to understand and assess their BoC.

Meeting with everyone allows us to formulate an understanding of the participants adaptable behaviours and determine their strengths and deficits. 

We also ensure that during the development of Behaviour Support Plans ongoing consultation is sought with our Aboriginal Staff from all positions with-in our organisation. This ensures that our Behaviour Support plans provide the appropriate cultural understanding of a participant’s behaviours as well as promoting appropriate strategies in line with cultural needs. 

Once we have the required information, we develop an in-depth and well researched plan with strategies to replace dysfunctional behaviours with functionally equivalent skills. This is assisted by reports from health professionals including Occupational Therapists, Psychologists and other Allied Health Professionals. The aim is that over time the client will have a minimisation of problematic behaviours and an increase in their quality of life.

Once we have completed the PBSP, we meet with the client, their family, providers and support workers to discuss the plan and how it should be implemented. Ongoing communication is very important to see which parts of the plan are successful and which are not. If something isn’t working, we will go back and re-evaluate the behaviour and start the process again.

It is critical in our work to regularly meet with those who work daily with clients and ensure that they are well versed in the strategies that have been formulated so that they have to tools they need to implement them in the best possible way for the participant. 

Our plans work through several stages of the participant’s behaviour to ensure that strategies are outlined to support the participant throughout their cycles of behaviours.