Disabled Person

The Interaction with Disabled Persons scale (IDP) has been used in research into baseline attitudes and to evaluate whether a shift in attitudes towards people with developmental disabilities has occurred following some form of intervention. This research has been conducted on the assumption that the IDP measures attitudes as a multidimensional construct and has good internal consistency. Such assumptions about

To examine gender differences according to health status in the oldest old people of the community. Cross-sectional multicentre study, within the framework of a clinical trial on falls and malnutrition. 7 primary health centres. Non-institutionalised patients of 85 years or over. The data collected included, socioeconomic data, cardiovascular risk factors, Barthel Index (BI), cognitive status with the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE), Charlson Index to measure comorbidity, nutritional risk evaluated by Nutritional Assessment questionnaire (MNA), mean visual analogue self-rating scale in Euroqol- 5D (EQ-VAS) to assess health related quality life and, Gijón social risk test, and prescribed drugs. A total of 312 subjects were included, of which 61.6% were women, 53% widows and a third of them lived alone. High blood pressure was observed in 76%, dyslipidemia in 51.2%, diabetes in 17.4%, median BI 95 (rank 0-100), MMSE 28 (0-35), Charlson index 1 (0-7), MNA 25 (10-30), Gijón test 10 (5-21), EQ-VAS 60 (0-100) and the mean prescription drugs 6.1±3.3. Women most frequently lived alone (P<.001), fell more (P<.006), had a greater nutritional (P<.016) and social risk (P<.001). Men were more likely to be married (P<.001), had better cognition (P<.003), better functional status (P<.018), and higher comorbidity (P<.001). Being a 85 years old man is associated with being married, having better functionality and cognition, and a higher comorbidity. While being a woman is associated with living alone, a higher rate of falls, and nutritional and social risk. These results are important to help this group of elderly to maintain their position in the community.

This paper discusses perceptions of disability as portrayed in the Abagusii and Nandi communities,of Kenya. It is motivated by the need to show that many,existing studies uphold blanket generalisations on disability and subsequently do not cater for different cultural views. For instance, existing literature is replete with cases describing the social stigma at- tached to disability which compounds,the social

Universal design is the design of products and environments so that anyone can use them without adaptation or specialised design. Life must be simplified by making products, communications and the built environment more usable for as many people as possible at little or no extra cost. To understand the chal- lenges that a disabled person has to face when using

Because of damage in the central nervous system, certain members of the population with severe speech impairments are not able to acquire sufficient literacy skills. Despite this handicap, they can become effective communicators by using different graphic or symbol systems. One of these non-verbal graphic systems is Blissymbolics. Bliss symbols are a set of simple pictograms, each representing a single object or concept.