At a glance
- Organisation: Lighthouse Collaborative Care
- Provision type: Children's Home
- Regulatory body: Ofsted
- Training delivered: Trauma-Informed Care including Restrictive Physical Intervention
- Review period: August 2025 to January 2026 (two quarters)
Headline results
- 0 restrictive physical interventions in the first quarter
- Only 2 interventions across 6 months, both proportionate and used as a last resort
- 0 workplace accidents and 0 days lost to injury
- A young person learning to self-regulate in shorter timeframes
Summary
Lighthouse Collaborative Care is a newly established children's home that brought together an entirely new team, most of whom had very limited prior experience of trauma-informed practice or managing children in crisis. +ProActive Approaches delivered comprehensive training in July and October 2025, providing the team with their foundational framework for understanding behaviour, responding to distress, and maintaining safety.
Within the first six months, the home recorded zero restrictive physical interventions in its opening quarter and only two across the entire review period, both used proportionately and as a last resort. Zero workplace accidents occurred and zero days were lost to injury. Despite facing significant challenges, including management changes, a period of team instability, and the complex needs of newly placed young people, the team demonstrated growing confidence in applying trauma-informed principles. Critically, the +ProActive Approaches framework was used not only to support the young people but also to recognise and address the wellbeing of the team itself during a period of significant disruption.
The context
Lighthouse Collaborative Care opened as a new children's home with a freshly recruited team. The majority of staff had very little previous experience of trauma-informed practice, and for many, the +ProActive Approaches training was their first exposure to this way of working. This meant that the team were not unlearning old habits or correcting embedded poor practice; they were building their understanding from the ground up.
The first young person moved into the home in October 2025, followed by a second in January 2026. Both brought complex needs, and the period under review included a number of significant challenges: a serious safeguarding incident, a change in home management, a period of team instability, and the inherent difficulties of establishing consistent routines and boundaries with young people who have experienced significant trauma.
This case study therefore tells a different story from one where training is introduced into an established setting. It demonstrates how trauma-informed training provided the essential foundation for a new team to navigate an unusually challenging opening period while keeping restrictive interventions to an absolute minimum.
The training
+ProActive Approaches delivered training to the Lighthouse team in two phases: the initial course took place in July 2025, prior to the first young person's arrival, with a further course in October 2025 as the team expanded. This meant that every member of staff had received training before working directly with the young people in their care.
The training covered trauma-informed care and restrictive physical intervention, equipping staff with the knowledge and skills to understand the function of behaviour, recognise triggers, apply primary and secondary strategies from positive support plans, and use physical intervention only as a last resort. Alongside the training itself, the use of +ProActive Approaches templates for risk assessments and Positive Support Plans gave the team structured tools to translate their learning into day-to-day practice.
The results: quarter by quarter
The impact of the training was tracked from the point of the first young person's admission using both quantitative data and qualitative feedback.
- Q1 (Aug to Oct 2025): 0 restrictive physical interventions, 3 incidents. New young person placed; 2 medication errors and 1 self-harm disclosure managed therapeutically
- Q2 (Nov 2025 to Jan 2026): 2 restrictive physical interventions, 6 incidents. A serious incident, a second young person placed, a management change and a period of team instability
In the opening quarter, the team achieved zero restrictive physical interventions despite supporting a young person through a disclosure of wanting to self-harm and end her life. Staff responded therapeutically, providing a trauma-informed response alongside access to immediate external support. The young person was able to regulate her feelings, and no restrictive intervention was necessary.
The second quarter presented significantly greater challenges. A serious incident occurred in early December when a young person gained unauthorised access to her mobile phone overnight, leading to a period of acute distress in which she made significant threats to harm herself and others. Restrictive physical intervention was required on two occasions during this episode, both proportionate and used as a last resort. Robust debriefs, post-incident conversations, key working sessions, and clinical supervision all followed. No further restrictive interventions were required for the remainder of the quarter.
The arrival of a second young person in January 2026 introduced further complexity. The existing young person found the transition difficult, particularly around differences in boundaries and restrictions. The team managed this instability using their trauma-informed framework, maintaining consistency despite the added pressures of operating without a permanent manager from mid-November onwards.
What changed: training in action
What makes the Lighthouse story particularly significant is not just the low numbers of restrictive interventions, but the depth of trauma-informed thinking the team demonstrated under genuinely difficult circumstances.
A therapeutic response to crisis
When the first young person disclosed feelings of wanting to self-harm and end her life in Q1, the team's response was exemplary. Rather than reacting with panic or resorting to restrictive measures, staff provided a calm, trauma-informed therapeutic response. They accessed immediate external support and, through their approach, helped the young person regulate her feelings and prevent harm. This single example demonstrates the value of equipping staff with understanding before they face a crisis, not after.
Restrictive intervention used appropriately and reflected upon
When restrictive physical intervention was required in Q2, the team followed on-call advice and intervened as a last resort to keep the young person safe. The interventions were appropriate, proportionate, and for the minimum length of time. Critically, debriefs identified learning points, including recognising when holds had been released before the young person had fully regulated, requiring a second hold. The team took this learning on board for future practice, demonstrating exactly the kind of reflective cycle that underpins effective trauma-informed care.
Young people learning to self-regulate
The team were proactive and successful in supporting their young person to develop positive self-regulation strategies. Over the review period, staff observed a measurable shift: in the most recent incident, the young person was able to self-regulate in a much shorter period of time and made appropriate, safe choices to achieve a positive outcome. This progression from external management to supported self-regulation is one of the clearest indicators that trauma-informed practice is embedding effectively.
Positive Support Plans as a foundation for confidence
The use of +ProActive Approaches templates for risk assessments and Positive Support Plans proved pivotal. The team reported that having clear, robust plans gave them the confidence that every aspect of how best to support individual young people had been considered, both during times of stability and during crisis. This structured approach provided a safety net that was particularly valuable for a team with limited prior experience.
Navigating adversity: the training beyond the young people
Perhaps the most telling evidence of the depth of impact of +ProActive Approaches training at Lighthouse came not from the young people's outcomes, but from how the training principles were applied to support the team through a period of significant internal disruption.
From mid-November 2025, the home operated without a permanent manager. The events surrounding the management change had a significant impact on team morale, relationships, and confidence. Staff felt unsettled, uncertain, and at times unsupported. The Responsible Individual stepped in to provide leadership and, in doing so, drew directly on the +ProActive Approaches framework.
The Responsible Individual recognised a core principle from the training: that an unsettled and unsafe team contributes to the same feelings for the young people living in that environment. This understanding informed the recovery approach. Staff were supported through debriefs, supervision, team meetings, and clinical supervision. Reflective practice was maintained. The principles of predictability, consistency, and emotional safety that the training taught for young people were applied to the staff team itself.
Within a relatively short period, the team regained their sense of purpose and commitment. Staff came back together around their shared vision of making a positive and meaningful difference to the lives of children who have experienced significant trauma. By January 2026, there was a greater sense of consistency across the rota, with senior staff working together to maintain stability on a day-to-day basis.
This experience underlines a critical point: trauma-informed training is not only about how we respond to the people we support. It is about how we care for the people doing the supporting. When staff feel held, heard, and safe, they are better placed to offer the same to the children and young people in their care.
Embedded reflective practice
Across both quarters, the Lighthouse team demonstrated that reflective practice had become part of the fabric of daily work rather than an afterthought. Debriefs were conducted after incidents and used purposefully to examine what had triggered events, what had worked, and what could be improved. Post-incident conversations with young people were meaningful and relationship-focused. Clinical supervision provided a safe space for staff to process their own emotional responses to challenging situations.
The team also showed growing professional curiosity, the ability to look beyond surface behaviour and ask what was driving it. Staff were able to identify why young people had struggled or gone into crisis. They recognised the impact of transitions, changes in staffing, differences in boundaries between young people, and the effects of disrupted routines. This curiosity, combined with the structured tools provided through the training, enabled the team to respond thoughtfully rather than reactively.
Summary of outcomes
- Zero restrictive physical interventions in the opening quarter, with only two across the full six-month review period
- Both interventions were proportionate, used as a last resort, and followed by meaningful debriefs that identified learning for future practice
- Zero workplace accidents and zero days lost to injury across both quarters
- A young person supported through a self-harm disclosure using a purely therapeutic, trauma-informed response with no restrictive intervention
- Evidence of young people learning to self-regulate more quickly, making safer choices during moments of distress
- Positive Support Plans and risk assessment templates provided the team with structured confidence to manage complex and unpredictable situations
- Trauma-informed principles applied to staff wellbeing during a period of significant team disruption, enabling recovery and renewed commitment
- Reflective practice, clinical supervision, and professional curiosity embedded as core elements of daily practice
This case study is published with the permission of Lighthouse Collaborative Care. Young people are not identified by name to protect their privacy. All data was collected and verified as part of the rolling annual review process.