Our choking prevention guide wins at the UK IDDSI Festival 2026

Last week we were at the UK IDDSI Festival, exhibiting alongside Care England and talking to more than 100 people about our good practice guide, Preventing choking deaths among people with learning disabilities.

We came home with an award. The guide was voted Favourite Supplier, Product or Service by the people at the event.

I genuinely wasn't expecting it. What makes it mean something is who voted. The people at IDDSI are the ones dealing with swallowing risk every day: speech and language therapists, care staff, managers, cooks and caterers. If they think the guide is useful, that's the test I care about most.

Why this guide exists

Choking keeps coming up when the deaths of people with learning disabilities are reviewed, and too many of those deaths were avoidable. Usually the risk was known. It was assessed and written down. It just didn't make it into what actually happened at the table.

That gap between the plan and the mealtime is what the guide is about. It's written for providers and focuses on what services can do in practice, not more policy.

Since the launch

We launched the guide in Parliament in July and the interest since then has been steady, and the conversations at IDDSI showed how many professionals and services are looking for something practical on this.

Thank you to IDDSI for a brilliant event, to our partners, and to everyone who came over to talk to us.