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Globally, there is limited research on how deaf and hard of hearing adults experience higher education and work. The purpose of the present study is to examine hard of hearing (HH) adults’ experiences of social interactions and social relationships in higher education, the workplace and leisure time. Data were obtained from semistructured interviews with 16 individuals (aged 24–31 years) from diverse cultural backgrounds (10 males and 6 females) with severe-to-profound hearing loss. Participants were selected based on previous expressed interest in participating in further studies after having been involved in an earlier study. The interviews were subjected to a qualitative thematic data analysis. According to the results, people with a hearing loss experience communication barrier in higher education, at work and in leisure time. These communication barriers lead to difficulties achieving social inclusion, and in some circumstances to social exclusion. Assistive technology (AT) and information and communication technologies (ICT) were important facilitators of moving from social exclusion towards social inclusion.

Purpose: To explore whether the personal assistance (PA) activities provided by the Swedish Act concern- ing Support and Service for Persons with Certain Functional Impairment in 2010 and 2015 promote par- ticipation in society according to Article 19 of the United Nations’ Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD).

Methods: Register data and data from two questionnaires were used (N1⁄42565). Descriptive statistics and chi-square (McNemar’s test) were used to describe the basic features of the data. Mixed binominal logistic regression was used to examine correlation between gender and hours of PA between 2010 and 2015.

Results: Despite an increase in the number of PA hours, more care activities and a reduction of most PA activities representing an active life were found. The result was especially evident for women, older peo- ple, and for a particular person category.

Conclusions: The results offer evidence of a shift to a medical model and indicate a risk of social exclu- sion due to fewer activities representing an active life. An increase on average of 16h of PA over the period studied does not guarantee access to an active life and may indicate a marginal utility. The noted decline of PA for participation in society enhances the importance of monitoring content aspects to fulfil Article 19 of the UNCRPD.

Purpose: While ageing is an inevitable phenomenon of life, physical activity is important for healthy ageing. Compared to the other age groups, older adults throughout the world have the lowest rate of participation in recommended levels of physical activity. This study aimed to investigate the physical activity status of the community-dwelling elderly population in Gujarat, India.

Method: This was a cross-sectional study. A door-to-door survey was conducted among selected communities near Vadodara in Gujarat. Based on the inclusion criteria (age≥60years, MMSE-≥24), 347 elderly persons were included in the study. Data was collected using the Global Physical Activity Questionnaire (GPAQ), and analysed using descriptive statistics.

Results: Among the 347 older adults (mean age 67.43±7.46 years) who participated in the study, 159 were male and 188 were female. While 125 participants (36%) were physically active at levels recommended by the World Health Organisation, 222(64%) were physically inactive.

Conclusion: Only 36% of the participants were physically active as per WHO recommendations. The men were more physically active than the women in the study sample. This study implies that there is a need to create an awareness regarding the importance of physical activity for healthy aging.

Background: Human movement, rehabilitation, and allied sciences have embraced their ambitions within the cycle of “RehabMove” congresses over the past 30 years. This combination of disciplines and collabo- rations in the Netherlands has tried to provide answers to questions in the fields of rehabilitation and adapted sports, while simultaneously generating new questions and challenges. These research questions help us to further deepen our understanding of (impaired) human movement and functioning, with and without supportive technologies, and stress the importance of continued multidisciplinary (inter)national collaboration.

Methods: This position stand provides answers that were conceived by the authors in a creative process underlining the preparation of the 6th RehabMove Congress.

Results: The take-home message of the RehabMove2018 Congress is a plea for continued multidisciplin- ary research in the fields of rehabilitation and adapted sports. This should be aimed at more individual- ized notions of human functioning, practice, and training, but also of performance, improved supportive technology, and appropriate “human and technology asset management” at both individual and organ- ization levels and over the lifespan.

Conclusions: With this, we anticipate to support the development of rehabilitation sciences and technol- ogy and to stimulate the use of rehabilitation notions in general health care. We also hope to help ensure a stronger embodiment of preventive and lifestyle medicine in rehabilitation practice. Indeed, general health care and rehabilitation practice require a healthy and active lifestyle management and research agenda in the context of primary, secondary, and tertiary prevention.

Purpose: Many children with autism spectrum disorder do not have symbolic play skills. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effects of a training procedure on the acquisition, maintenance, and generalization of object-substitution symbolic play in children with autism spectrum disorder.

Methods: A single-case experimental design (multiple-probe across four behaviors) was used. One girl (5 years) and two boys (4–5 years) participated in this study. The training procedure involved withdrawing necessary items in play activities, supplying multiple substitutes, and providing hierarchical assistive prompts. Each child’s symbolic play responses across baseline, intervention, and follow-up conditions were recorded and graphed. Data analysis involved visual inspection of graphs.

Results: The results indicated that the procedure effectively increased and maintained object-substitution symbolic play. Generalization to untaught play activities occurred in all children, and symbolic play increased in the free play setting for one child.

Conclusions: Arranging play activities with missing items increased opportunities for children to engage in symbolic play. The training procedure can be used in clinical and educational settings as an initial step to establish and improve complex play behavior in children with autism spectrum disorder who lack such skills.

Purpose: The prevalence of clinically relevant depressive symptoms among clients with Type 2 diabetes mellitus is in the range of 30%. Since these conditions are often under-diagnosed and under-treated in clinical practice, they negatively affect functional recovery, adherence to treatment, and the quality of life. Despite the large body of evidence regarding the effects of exercise training on different aspects of diabetes, no updated conclusive article that reviews depression is available. This article aims to review the current literature on exercise training and its effect on depression in people with Type 2 diabetes mellitus.

Method: An electronic search of literature from 2010, highlighting the effects of exercise on depression among Type 2 diabetes mellitus clients, was conducted using Google Scholar and PubMed.  Relevant articles were utilised for this review.  The selected studies are based on relational and rehabilitative exercise training approaches.

Results: While most of the studies support the efficacy of exercise training, study settings and described models are not conclusive.  No single clearly defined model exists for exercise training for depression among people with diabetes. There is evidence for the efficacy of supervised aerobic exercise in the treatment of depression, when undertaken three times weekly at moderate intensity, for a minimum of eight weeks. Further research is required to develop specific exercise training models that can be tested in experimental studies for this client group.

Conclusion: The current review showed that exercise training can be used to alleviate depression among people with diabetes. Future studies should adopt rigorous methodological criteria to back up the present findings.

Purpose: To find modifiable factors that are related to subjective well-being would be valuable for improving interventions in fibromyalgia. Physical activity, sedentary behaviour, and physical fitness may represent potential areas to optimize treatment regimens. In fibromyalgia, there is a discordance between clinical observations and patient-reported outcomes (objective and subjective assessments). Therefore, the present study aims at analyzing the associations of objective and subjective evaluations of physical activity, sedentary behaviour, and physical fitness with subjective well-being and determine if and how objective and subjective associations differ.

Methods: In this population-based cross-sectional study participated 375 women with fibromyalgia from the al-Ándalus project (Spain). Physical activity, sedentary behaviour, and physical fitness were objectively (accelerometers and performance testing) and subjectively (questionnaires) measured. Participants self-reported their levels of positive affect, negative affect, and life satisfaction.

Results: In the most conservative multivariate analysis, we found independent associations of the objective measures of physical activity with positive affect and life satisfaction and sedentary behaviour with positive affect. No such relationship was seen with subjective measures of the same behaviours. Moreover, we observed that objective and subjective physical fitness evaluations were independent of each other related to subjective well-being.

Conclusions: Independent associations of the objective measures (but not the subjective assessments) of physical activity with positive affect and life satisfaction, and of sedentary behaviour with positive affect were observed. However, objective measures and subjective appraisals of physical fitness appear to be independently related to well-being, which should be considered when developing physical exercise interventions for fibromyalgia.

Background: Vocational rehabilitation (VR) aims to rehabilitate a person with an amputation back into actively participating in society. Even though lower limb amputation (LLA) surgery is commonly performed in South Africa (SA), little research has been published on the participation restrictions experienced by and vocational needs of persons with LLA in the Western Cape (WC).

Objectives: The aim of this study was to determine and explore the participation restrictions and VR needs of persons with a unilateral LLA in the WC.

Method: A mixed-methods approach and a sequential exploratory design were utilised to collect data from 50 persons with an LLA. Participants were conveniently sampled within the Cape Metropole region of the WC, SA. The World Health Organization Disability Assessment Schedule 2.0 (WHODAS 2.0) tool was used to collect the quantitative data, and telephonic interviews were conducted for qualitative data collection.

Results: A third (28%) of participants in this study were unemployed, and only 14% (n = 7) of the participants owned or used a prosthesis. In addition, 50% of the participants either had a disability grant or were on pension. The participation restrictions identified were mainly related to mobility where 74% (n = 37) of participants had extreme difficulty with mobility in general, 92% (n = 46) struggled with walking distances longer than 1 km and 80% (n = 40) had extreme difficulty in completing household tasks quickly. The main VR needs identified in this study were the inadequate rehabilitation services that target ambulation (standing and walking) to facilitate employment.

Conclusion: Persons with a unilateral LLA still experience significant difficulties in mobility 3 months post-amputation, which negatively affects their participation in society and vocational activities.

African Journal of Disability, Vol 8, 2019

This paper draws upon education policy sociology, and sport coaching literature, in critically examining sport coaches as policy actors. Stephen Ball and colleagues’ conceptualisation of different policy actor positions and roles provided the framework for research that investigated how eight professional swimming coaches in Victoria, Australia, interpreted and enacted disability and inclusion policy. A discourse analysis of semi-structured interviews with the eight coaches reveals the complexities associated with how and why different coaches interpret and enact disability and inclusion policy imperatives in different ways in their specific club contexts. Data are presented that shows coaches adopting multiple and hybrid policy actor positions and roles as disability and inclusion policy was interpreted, translated and ultimately, expressed as pedagogic rules and practices. Our discussion brings to the fore questions about power, agency and control in coaching, while highlighting both limits and possibilities for the enactment of inclusive disability sport policies by swimming coaches working in Victoria, Australia. In conclusion we suggest that this research illustrates that coaches are capable of enacting social change, and have some agency to do so, but at the same time appear constrained by established discourses that shape policy and give important direction to pedagogic practice. We advocate that further in-depth research is required into the coaching policy-practice nexus, particularly as it relates to the advancement of equity and inclusion.