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This tip sheet provides an overview of the factors that may put persons with disabilities at heightened risk in the COVID-19 pandemic and response in humanitarian settings; and recommends actions to address these risks within your COVID health response. This note draws on actionable and evidenced recommendations from the IASC Guidelines on Inclusion of Persons with Disabilities in Humanitarian Action, health chapter applying these to the COVID-19 pandemic, the WHO guidance for Disability inclusion in COVID-19 response, SODEN Statement on how COVID-19 is affecting persons with disabilities in Somalia and the practical field experience of HI and collaborating partners in Somalia.

Evidence is emerging that persons with disabilities are being disproportionately affected by the Coronavirus pandemic and emergency measures being taken by governments worldwide. As governments rush to respond to the virus, it is more critical than ever to guarantee that measures taken are fully inclusive of persons with disabilities and prevent human rights violations from taking place.

With the endorsements of the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Right to Health, Mr Dainius Pūras, and the UN Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, Ms Catalina Devandas Aguilar, a coalition of six disability rights organisations is today launching a major international monitoring initiative entitled “COVID-19 Disability Rights Monitor” to conduct rapid independent monitoring of state measures concerning persons with disabilities. The first element of this global initiative is the launch of two surveys requesting official information from governments and requesting the testimonies of persons with disabilities and their representative organisations. The surveys aim to collect information about what states are doing to protect core rights of persons with disabilities including the rights to life, access to health and essential services.

Purpose: 

This paper describes international actions to collaborate in the assistive technology (AT) arena and provides an update of programmes supporting AT globally.

Methods: 

The World Health Organisation (WHO) identifies the severe global uneven distribution of resources, expertise and extensive unmet need for AT, as well the optimistic substantial capability for innovations and developments in appropriate and sustainable AT design, development and delivery. Systems thinking and market shaping are identified as means to address these challenges and leverage the ingenuity and expertise of AT stakeholders.

Results: 

This paper is a ‘call to action’, showcasing emerging AT networks as exemplars of a distributed, but integrated mechanism for addressing AT needs globally, and describing the Global Alliance of Assistive Technology Organisations (GAATO) as a vehicle to facilitate this global networking.

Conclusion:

 Partners in this Global Alliance aim to advance the field of assistive technology by promoting shared research, policy advocacy, educating people and organisations within and outside the field, teaching, training and knowledge transfer by pulling together broad-based membership organisations.

Recommendations for inclusion of marginalised and vulnerable groups in risk communications and community engangement are made. Groups considered are: children; people with disabilities; women and girls; pregnant women; persons living with HIV; gender based violence survivors; refugees and migrants; elderly; people in existing humanitarian emergencies; people with pre-existing medical conditions; sexual and gender minorities; ethnic minorities.

In order to reduce the spread and impact of COVID 19 on persons with disabilities globally, The Albino Foundation-DISABILITY INCLUSION NIGERIA PROJECT in alignment with the recommendations of International Disability Alliance (IDA) has come up with simple steps to mitigating the virus within this vulnerable population. The basic measures includes:

1.0 Persons with disabilities

2.0 Government

3.0 Members of the public

Partly due to a lack of evidence-based methods to support people with intellectual disability (ID) and challenging behavior, their needs are often poorly met. One way to generate rapid evidence is to systematically describe and monitor interventions that are considered to be “good practice”—to develop evidence based on practical knowledge. This study describes the Dutch practice-based intervention Triple-C (Client, Coach, Competence). The intervention was developed in practice to support people with severe ID to borderline functioning and challenging behavior. The practice-based nature of Triple-C means that many of the professionals’ actions or activities are often underpinned by their implicit knowledge about the intervention they are delivering. Consequently, as the emphasis is on practice, the professionals can find it difficult to articulate how the intervention is operationalized and positive change achieved. This study aimed to assess the practical knowledge of Triple-C professionals and to develop an understanding of the mechanisms of change for Triple-C to improve understanding and to inform future research about the intervention. Through an iterative process, a logic model was developed to describe the intervention and its underlying assumptions. The development of the logic model was shaped using interviews with the founders, focus groups with support staff, psychologists, managers and members of the board of a service provider, and the analysis of published accounts of the Triple-C intervention. Data gathered from these sources were analyzed using content analysis. The logic model of the Triple-C intervention provides insight into the key elements of the approach, such as the need for unconditional supportive relationship and carrying out meaningful activities. Moreover, the potential relationship with existing evidence-based interventions such as Positive Behavioral Support and Active Support are described. Dening the underlying logic of a practice-based intervention like Triple-C is an important first step toward producing an evidence base for interventions developed from clinical practice.

This toolkit: (1) explains your communication rights; (2) provides tips on advocating for them, and (3) has an accommodation request form you can bring to the hospital.

United States version.

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.

Background: Pain in children with cerebral palsy (CP) has its sources in musculoskeletal problems that can influence learning in a school setting. Best pain management is essential for these children, but school staff may not keep up to date with the latest developments and interventions. Therefore, staff’s perceptions of beneficial strategies may not comply with contemporary scientific knowledge about effective evidence-based interventions.

Objectives: This study investigated how pain management intervention for children with CP in South African schools complied with international scientific knowledge about evidence-based interventions. The intention was to provide support for an update of knowledge on both individual level (i.e. professionals) and system level (i.e. decision makers).

Method: Five focus groups were conducted with staff members at five schools for children with special educational needs in South Africa. Manifest and latent content analyses of professional statements identified interventions reported as beneficial and related them to higher and lower levels of intervention evidence as reported at the time of data collection.

Results: Most treatment strategies concerned motor functioning that fell within the framework of physiotherapists and occupational therapists. Access to orthopaedic expertise was limited, waiting times were long and medication for spasticity treatment was not offered.

Conclusion: A discrepancy between published evidence and clinical practice for pain management in children with CP in South African school settings was noted. Suggestions for improved early intervention to identify children’s hips at risk through surveillance programmes; and orthopaedic management are proposed to prevent deformities and unnecessary suffering in South African children with CP.

African Journal of Disability, Vol 8, 2019