Scary situation

“Just for a moment picture this situation, you are at work in your care home on a night shift. You hear unusual sounds coming from behind the door of one your service-users rooms. You decide to go and investigate, knocking on the door. No answer so you decide to go in and investigate. You open the door and it doesn’t fully open. Squeezing your head around the door you see your service-user partially suspended by a ligature attached to coat-hanger on the door. You shout for help and for someone to call 999. A co-worker arrives and you both just about manage to undo the ligature and release the service-user. On this occasion the service-user is safe. But what if it happens again?”

We got an urgent call from a customer that needed short notice ligature training for their staff who were scared that this situation might happen again and if it did they would know what to do. We arranged a date to go in and do a ligature training course for their staff. It was clear on arrival that the staff were very concerned that they would not be able to cope if they encountered a similar situation.

The ligature training went extremely well and all the staff at the end of the training that they now felt confident in handling a ligature emergency in the future.

To find out more about our ligature courses please visit:

https://www.meducatetraining.co.uk/training-courses/anti-ligature-training-essex/

Is train the trainer right for you?

Dear Care Provider,

There is no question about it, buying training is expensive and eats up a large chunk of a health and social care company’s budget.

Organisations just like yours are always looking not only to save money but also utilise their own existing resources to deliver training.

We frequently get asked to deliver Ligature ‘train the trainer’ and when customers buy from us, we are proud to say that we get positive feedback from clients.

In October we were approached by Horizon Care and asked to train their L&D team to be able to teach their own care staff how to remove ligatures in a ligature emergency. We were able to tailor a bespoke ‘train the trainer’ day for them to learn the skills necessary to go out and deliver this potentially life-saving training to their care teams across the country.

Here is the testimonial they left on our website:

“I used Mark (Meducate Training Ltd)  to train our L&D team to be able train Ligature Release within our organisation. The course was well structured and set at a pace that suited us. Mark is a very experienced trainer who ensured that the training not only met the stated outcomes but was also flexible enough to meet our individual needs. This is the second time that I have engaged Mark’s services and would not hesitate to do so again. Thoroughly recommended.

Dave Williams,  L&D Manager, Horizon Care and Education Group Ltd”

We followed up with them recently and were informed that they had already delivered 7 courses to groups of staff with many more scheduled for the near future. The saving they have made on doing training this way is substantial.

Check out how much we charge for ligature training here and do the math and then compare what we charge for the ‘train the trainer’ course here and you can see the potential for huge cost savings for your organisation. If you have the right staff with the desire and motivation to train, then this could be the solution for you!

Ligature Pleasure and Pain

What has a 17^th Century treatment for erectile dysfunction got to do with ligature incidents in the 21^st Century?

Back then male hanging victims were observed having erections during their executions and it is believed that this observation is what led to some people practising what is called Auto-Erotic Asphyxia (EA)

EA is the deliberate action of restricting blood and oxygen supply to the brain with a ligature  to create a euphoric high which combined with masturbation can provide an intense sexual high as the brain releases a very strong pain relief chemical called endorphins along with the pleasure released during orgasm.

EA is not talked about widely outside professional circles for fear of putting ‘ideas into peoples heads’ especially those that are young and impressionable and is also thought to be under-reported due to parents ‘disguising’ their child’s death as suicide by ‘sanitising’ the scene removing any pornographic material etc before alerting the authorities.

Whilst engaging in EA participants usually set themselves up with a  fail-safe mechanism such as slip-knot or something close by to stand back up onto in order to self-rescue before they lose consciousness.

However, unfortunately sometimes the person is unable to rescue themselves due to onset of weakness or unconsciousness and end up hanging themselves to death.

Although no statistics have ever been recorded in the UK for these types of deaths a study in the USA estimated that there are between 500 and 1000 deaths every year from EA. A study of 135 such cases by the FBI determined the average age of victims to be 26.

What does this mean for you?

If you are looking after people in health and social care whether they are young people or adults, a ligature attempt may occur not as an episode of self-harm or a serious suicide attempt but as an act of sexual experimentation. Unfortunately, this is a type of sexual experimentation that could have fatal consequences for someone engaging in it.

Although the subject of EA is not widely publicised a quick search of social media sites will pop up references to this practice including imagery and how-to guides. For example, just now I typed the term into Instagram and there were 1000+ posts listed on the subject.

Your clients may well have unrestricted access to the internet and social media so it is possible that with a little bit of searching they could find out information about and decide that this type of ligature incident is something they want to try.

Mark Wigley is owner of markwigley.online and Director of Meducate Training Ltd and provides classroom ligature training online ligature e-learning and ligature ‘train the trainer’ via live webinar and as a classroom course.

How I got into Ligature Training

My name is Mark Wigley and I run a trusted training provider called Meducate Training Ltd and we deliver Ant-Ligature training.

Back in 2013 I was approached by Manchester Probation Service and asked to produce and deliver what I thought would be a one-off ligature course in Manchester. Based on previous experience in law-enforcement I knew I had the skills and experience to provide an amazing training event, which I did. They were so pleased with the course that they went on to sign up for 2 year delivery programme of ligature training across all their Approved Premises as well as booking my company for emergency first aid training. Not bad at all!

I also advertised my new ligature course on my website www.meducatetraining.co.uk and before long we were swamped with enquiries and orders from Mental Health hospitals, children’s residential services and services that care for adults with learning disabilities. Often these requests were frantic short notice requests for training as a result of an ‘at risk of ligature referral’. Feedback from all our courses has been extremely positive and staff that attended have all said that they feel more confident in dealing with a ligature emergency as a result of the training.

In 2017 we developed an Anti-Ligature Train The Trainer course package as it was clear from talking to some of the delegates that there are plenty of staff that are capable of delivering this training to their own staff. This can be delivered onsite at your location or at our training centre in Colchester, Essex.

So, why not book us for your ligature training or enquire to find out more!