Last week, our friends Together for Short Lives, the UK charity for children’s palliative care, announced eight new innovative projects that have received funding through its Improving Transitions for Young People Fund.

The Improving Transitions for Young People Fund is Together for Short Lives’ ground-breaking funding programme, seeking to address the cliff edge in care experienced by young adults in their transition from children’s to adult services.

One of the newly-funded projects, Talking about… sex and relationships: Young people speak out, has links with the Living Life to the Fullest project’s Lucy Watts MBE and Kirsty Liddiard. Lucy and Kirsty first began working  together as part of the Sexuality Alliance, a collaboration of Together for Short Lives and the Open University. The Sexuality Alliance developed ground-breaking sexuality guidance and standards for professionals who support young people with life-limiting conditions. You can find out more about the Sexuality Alliance here, or check out the Guidance and Standards here.

Skip forward a couple of years and the Talking about… sex and relationships: Young people speak out project, led by and for young people with The Open University Sexuality Alliance and Hospice UK, is designed to develop a range of Open Educational Resources (OERs) that will facilitate young people to have conversations about sex, intimacy and relationships with their family, carers or professional support staff. Our Living Life to the Fullest co-researcher Lucy Watts MBE has been the driving force behind the development of this project, along with Maddie Blackburn, an academic at the Open University. 

Excitingly, the project will also equip health practitioners to provide better support to young people on this invisible topic through knowledge, resources and a better understanding of the views and experiences of young people themselves. You can learn more about the Improving Transitions for Young People Fund here.