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Parents of disabled children face many challenges. Understanding their experiences and acknowledging contextual influences is vital in developing intervention strategies that fit their daily realities. However, studies of parents from a resource-poor context are particularly scarce. This ethnographic study with 30 mothers from a South African township (15 semi-structured interviews and 24 participatory group sessions) unearths how mothers care on their own, in an isolated manner. The complexity of low living standards, being poorly supported by care structures and networks, believing in being the best carer, distrusting others due to a violent context, and resigning towards life shape and are shaped by this solitary care responsibility. For disability inclusive development to be successful, programmes should support mothers by sharing the care responsibility taking into account the isolated nature of mothers’ lives and the impact of poverty. This can provide room for these mothers to increase the well-being of themselves and their children.

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to explore support persons’ views on remote communication for persons with communicative and cognitive disabilities, and on factors enabling self-determination and participation.

Materials and methods: Five focus groups with 21 support persons were conducted. They were recorded and transcribed and data were analyzed qualitatively using focus group analysis methodology.

Results: The participants experience how remote communication can enable users to have increased control in their lives and how remote communication can enable self-determination and participation. Access to remote communication has a dual effect on safety. There are experiences about communicative rights of the users not being met and there is a need for better access to technology, information, and experts. There is also a need for more competence and coordination among staff and support to the users. Challenges emerge in the support persons’ dedication to the users’ right to communicate.

Conclusion: People with communicative and cognitive disabilities need access to remote communication in order to have control over their own lives and to achieve self-determination and participation in society. Support persons carry a large responsibility and can provide valuable insights of users’ communication situation.

Purpose: To explore barriers and pathways to the inclusion of persons with mental and intellectual disabilities in technical and vocational education and training programmes in four East African countries, in order to pave the way to greater inclusion.

Materials and methods: An explorative, qualitative study including 10 in-depth interviews and a group discussion was conducted with coordinators of different programmes in four East African countries. Two independent researchers coded the interviews inductively using Atlas.ti. The underlying framework used is the culture, structure, and practice model.

Results: Barriers and pathways to inclusion were found in the three interrelated components of the model. They are mutually reinforcing and are thus not independent of one another. Barriers regarding culture include negative attitudes towards persons with mental illnesses, structural barriers relate to exclusion from primary school, rigid curricula and untrained teachers and unclear policies. Culture and structure hence severely hinder a practice of including persons with mental disabilities in technical and vocational education and training programmes. Pathways suggested are aiming for a clearer policy, more flexible curricula, improved teacher training and more inclusive attitudes.

Conclusions: In order to overcome the identified complex barriers, systemic changes are necessary. Suggested pathways for programme coordinators serve as a starting point.

The possibility to participate in education and lifelong learning has been introduced in EU disability policy in recent decades as one of the key means to improve the socioeconomic position of disabled persons. Simultaneously, lifelong learning has been developed as the defining concept of EU education policy to increase social cohesion and economic competitiveness. However, the education, employment rate and socioeconomic status of disabled persons have remained far below the EU average. In this article, we theo- rize governmentality to explore (1) how EU lifelong learning and disability policy discourses constitute and govern disabled persons and (2) how disabled persons are positioned in the policy dis- courses. The data consist of the most relevant EU policy documents concerning lifelong learning and disability policy in the twenty-first century. We argue that the policies constitute and govern disabled persons as a group who do not fulfil the premises set for the lifelong learner, and that consequently, policy dis- courses marginalize disabled persons instead.

Background: The optimal management strategy for multiple sclerosis (MS), and many other chronic diseases, likely involves health behavior modification. Multimodal behavioral interventions may be most effective, but little is known about long-term adherence in people with MS.

Methods: This qualitative study assessed barriers and enablers to long-term adherence by people with MS who self-selected for a 5-day health behavior intervention 3–5 years prior. Thirteen women and five men participated in semi-structured phone interviews, which were transcribed and thematically analyzed.

Results: The experience was described as useful for information gathering, decision making, and practical strategies regarding health behaviors. The majority still followed supplementation and dietary recommendations most of the time, although consuming non-recommended food while eating out was common. Support at home, ability and enjoyment in food preparation, and ability to resist unhealthy foods were both barriers and enablers. Adherence to “time-consuming” exercise and meditation recommendations were less common and episodic. Many reported competing interests on time from work and family; and barriers including injuries and symptoms, weather, financial or geographical barriers, and lack of person-centred support and motivation. Increased fitness and mobility, weight loss, and a sense of accomplishment and control were advantages and motivators. Practical and attitudinal strategies employed included planning, tailoring activities to ability and preference, and self-monitoring.

Conclusion: While most people attempted to engage with all components of the intervention initially, only some still engaged with all components, and none to the recommended levels. These data can inform future quantitative studies and health behavior interventions.

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to describe how everyday life is experienced by next of kin sharing residence with a person who falls due to multiple sclerosis (MS).

Methods: Twenty face-to-face interviews were analysed using a qualitative content analysis.

Results: The overall theme “Making it work” represents the next of kin’s struggle to make life work. It comprises three themes: “Taking responsibility”, “Making adjustments”, and “Standing aside for someone else”. The two first themes reflect what relatives do to make the situation work, and the last theme represents what they give up.

Conclusion: Next of kin who share residence and everyday life with a person with MS are affected by that person’s occasional falls. They often take on the responsibility of preventing such falls and adapt their lives practically and emotionally. However, adaptation is neither always enough or always possible. In these cases, relatives often deprioritize their own needs and free time to make everyday life in the home work.

Background: Persons with disabilities have often been overlooked in the context of HIV and AIDS risk prevention and service provision. This paper explores access to and use of HIV information and services among persons with disabilities.

Methods: We conducted a multi-country qualitative research study at urban and rural sites in Uganda, Zambia, and Ghana: three countries selected to exemplify different stages of the HIV response to persons with disabilities. We conducted key informant interviews with government officials and service providers, and focus group discussions with persons with disabilities and caregivers. Research methods were designed to promote active, meaningful participation from persons with disabilities, under the guidance of local stakeholder advisors.

Results: Persons with disabilities emphatically challenged the common assumption that persons with disabilities are not sexually active, pointing out that this assumption denies their rights and – by denying their circumstances – leaves them vulnerable to abuse. Among persons with disabilities, knowledge about HIV was limited and attitudes towards HIV services were frequently based upon misinformation and stigmatising cultural beliefs; associated with illiteracy especially in rural areas, and rendering people with intellectual and developmental disability especially vulnerable. Multiple overlapping layers of stigma towards persons with disabilities (including internalised self-stigma and stigma associated with gender and abuse) have compounded each other to contribute to social isolation and impediments to accessing HIV information and services. Participants suggested approaches to HIV education outreach that emphasise the importance of sharing responsibility, promoting peer leadership, and increasing the active, visible participation of persons with disabilities in intervention activities, in order to make sure that accurate information reflecting the vulnerabilities of persons with disabilities is accessible to people of all levels of education. Fundamental change to improve the skills and attitudes of healthcare providers and raise their sensitivity towards persons with disabilities (including recognising multiple layers of stigma) will be critical to the ability of HIV service organisations to implement programs that are accessible to and inclusive of persons with disabilities.

Discussion: We suggest practical steps towards improving HIV service accessibility and utilisation for persons with disabilities, particularly emphasising the power of community responsibility and support; including acknowledging compounded stigma, addressing attitudinal barriers, promoting participatory responses, building political will and generating high-quality evidence to drive the continuing response.

Conclusions: HIV service providers and rehabilitation professionals alike must recognise the two-way relationship between HIV and disability, and their multiple overlapping vulnerabilities and stigmas. Persons with disabilities demand recognition through practical steps to improve HIV service accessibility and utilisation in a manner that recognises their vulnerability and facilitates retention in care and adherence to treatment. In order to promote lasting change, interventions must look beyond the service delivery context and take into account the living circumstances of individuals and communities affected by HIV and disability.

Purpose: People with mild intellectual disabilities (MID) generally live independently among the wider community. This can result in social exclusion and feelings of loneliness. Therefore, social work organizations aim to socially include people with MID through organizing activities in neighbourhoods that should lead to enlarged networks and increased societal participation. The “Communal Table” is such a, group-orientated, intervention that organizes monthly dinners in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. Because little is known about the effective- ness of interventions aiming to bring about social inclusion for people with MID we explored which types of participants were reached and whether and how the intervention brought about the intended outcomes.

Methods: We performed a theory-based evaluation, using participatory observations and qualitative interviews (n = 19). The Communal Table attracted a diverse and loyal group of participants.

Results: We distinguished four types of participants—lonely participants, activist participants, satisfied participants and calculating participants—whose pre-existing networks played a significant role in their individual needs for support and the outcomes of the intervention. Outcomes reported included experiences of conviviality and warmth, temporary relief of underlying problems and an overall positive opinion about the intervention, but network enlargement or increased societal participation were not reported.

Conclusions: Our findings suggest that social network interventions for people with MID should be tailored to participants’ pre-existing networks and related individual needs to be successful.

Few studies have addressed the daily practice of applied teacher strategies aimed at facilitating the social participation of students with social-emotional problems or behavioural difficulties (SEBD). In this paper, we present two interlinked studies that address this topic. The main study reports on the development of the Teacher Strategy Questionnaire on Social Participation in the Classroom (TSQ-SPC). We tested the questionnaire’s construct validity by performing a second-order confirmatory factor analysis. The follow-up study presents the results of a survey of 163 Dutch general primary education teachers of inclusive classes using a modified version of the TSQ-SPC. It provides insights on the strategies that teachers apply in their daily practice to facilitate positive social participation of students with SEBD. The findings of both studies suggest that general primary education teachers apply a limited repertoire of strategies. Accordingly, there is an urgent need for further research focusing on the development of interventions and revisions of the pre- and in-service teacher development curricula aimed at adequately supporting and preparing general education teachers.