ABSTRACT
This chapter describes the process whereby a family therapy service for adults with intellectual disabilities and their families was created. It focuses on the key events together with some of the obstacles and challenges that were faced on the way. The chapter explores some ideas about how this kind of service can be evaluated in order to help us shape the service as it evolves into the future. The clinical psychology team in Newham has developed a family therapy service for adults with intellectual disabilities and their families. The chapter also describes the journey took in setting up a systemic therapy service in a community team for people with intellectual disabilities. This initiative stemmed from an increasing awareness that people with intellectual disabilities live within a complex system of carers, services, and agencies and, as such, sometimes encounter difficulties that can best be understood from a systemic perspective.
