Virtual special issue on the World Report on Disability

Today Disability and Rehabilitation published a virtual special issue to "bring together papers published in the last two years which address the World report on disability research agenda, with a specific focus on health and rehabilitation." (Muller, 2014, p. 1486).

Tom Shakespeare and Alana Officer were the guest editors, and wrote:

• "Interventions such as an appropriate wheelchair, speech and language therapy can make the difference between being included, and being left on the margins." (Shakespeare & Officer, 2014, p. 1487)
• "the editors of this special issue fervently hope that these papers contribute to promoting these shared understandings and partnership working, so that the lives of people with disabilities will be improved." (p. 1488)

My colleagues and I are honoured to be included in the special issue

McLeod, S., McAllister, L., McCormack, J., & Harrison, L. J. (2014). Applying the World Report on Disability to children’s communication. Disability and Rehabilitation, 36(18), 1518-1528. doi:10.3109/09638288.2013.833305

Here is our abstract:

Purpose: The World Report on Disability is an important milestone in the recognition of people with disabilities; however, the Report acknowledges that people with communication difficulties may be underrepresented in estimates of disability. Consequently, this article applies the nine recommendations from the World Report on Disability to supporting children’s communication skills. Method: Australia is similar to most Minority World countries since it places high regard on articulate and literate communication. Recent large-scale Australian studies of children with speech, language and communication needs were reviewed to determine prevalence, impact and associated environmental and personal factors. Studies of met and unmet need were reviewed and discussed in relation to legislation and policies. Results: Recent years have seen improvements in the collection of and access to disability data about children’s communication, including the involvement of children in research about the impact of communication difficulties on their lives. The prevalence of speech and language impairment in children is high and is associated with poorer educational and social outcomes at school-age. Significant unmet need for services was noted, and there were differences in health, education and disability policies regarding access to services. Conclusions: Updated legislation, policies and practices are needed to more effectively support access to services to support children’s communication across health, education and disability sectors.Implications for Rehabilitation

• There is a high prevalence of speech and language impairment in Australian children.
• Childhood speech and language impairment (and associated communication disability) can impact educational, social, behavioural and occupational outcomes throughout life.
• Many Australian children do not have sufficient access to targeted services (including speech-language pathology) to ameliorate the impact of their communication disability.
• Formulation of a national strategy to support children children’s communication is required.

Read More: http://informahealthcare.com/doi/abs/10.3109/09638288.2013.833305

Muller, D. (2014). Announcing the upcoming publication of a virtual special issue of Disability and Rehabilitation. Disability and Rehabilitation, 36(18), 1486-1486. doi: 10.3109/09638288.2014.960655
 
Shakespeare, T., & Officer, A. (2014). Breaking the barriers, filling the gaps. Disability and Rehabilitation, 36(18), 1487-1488. doi:10.3109/09638288.2013.878552

Applying the World Report on Disability to children’s communication

The following manuscript has just been published online

McLeod, S., McAllister, L., McCormack, J., & Harrison, L. J. (2013, in press). Applying the World Report on Disability to children’s communication. Disability and Rehabilitation, doi:10.3109/09638288.2013.833305

Here is the abstract:

Purpose: The World Report on Disability is an important milestone in the recognition of people with disabilities; however, the Report acknowledges that people with communication difficulties may be underrepresented in estimates of disability. Consequently, this article applies the nine recommendations from the World Report on Disability to supporting children’s communication skills. Method: Australia is similar to most Minority World countries since it places high regard on articulate and literate communication. Recent large-scale Australian studies of children with speech, language and communication needs were reviewed to determine prevalence, impact and associated environmental and personal factors. Studies of met and unmet need were reviewed and discussed in relation to legislation and policies. Results: Recent years have seen improvements in the collection of and access to disability data about children’s communication, including the involvement of children in research about the impact of communication difficulties on their lives. The prevalence of speech and language impairment in children is high and is associated with poorer educational and social outcomes at school-age. Significant unmet need for services was noted, and there were differences in health, education and disability policies regarding access to services. Conclusions: Updated legislation, policies and practices are needed to more effectively support access to services to support children’s communication across health, education and disability sectors.

Implications for Rehabilitation

• There is a high prevalence of speech and language impairment in Australian children.
• Childhood speech and language impairment (and associated communication disability) can impact educational, social, behavioural and occupational outcomes throughout life.
• Many Australian children do not have sufficient access to targeted services (including speech-language pathology) to ameliorate the impact of their communication disability.
• Formulation of a national strategy to support children children’s communication is required.

Keywords: Communication, disability, ICF, ICF-CY, language, speech, World Health Organization, World Report on Disability

Figure 1. Drawings created by 4- to 5-year-old children with speech impairment in response to being asked to draw themselves talking to someone. These examples are of drawings that accentuated the listener’s ears, and many of these examples also demonstrate the listener or speaker leaning towards the other, possibly to facilitate understanding of the spoken message. Copyright 2012 by S. McLeod, L. McAllister, J. McCormack and L. J. Harrison. Reprinted with permission.

IJSLP issue on World Report on Disability promoted at IALP

 During the IALP congress, the International Journal of Speech-Language Pathology's scientific forum on the World Report on Disability (WRD) was profiled (see here for more details about the issue). The authors of the lead article (Karen Wylie, Lindy McAllister, Bronwyn Davidson, and Julie Marshall) presented two seminars based on the issue, there was a special IALP report on the WRD, and issues of IJSLP were given out for free (hard copy or electronically) to the IALP participants as well.

Lead authors on the WRD scientific forum:
Julie Marshall (UK), Bronwyn Davidson (Australia), Lindy McAllister (Australia), Karen Wylie (Ghana)

Authors on the IJSLP WRD scientific forum from Australia, UK, South Africa, USA, and Ghana

Sharynne McLeod (Editor of IJSLP) with Caroline Purslow (informa) at IALP in Turin, Italy

Applying the World Report on Disability to children’s communication

The following manuscript has been accepted for publication

McLeod, S., McAllister, L., McCormack, J. & Harrison, L. J. (2013, in press August). Applying the World Report on Disability to children’s communication. Disability and Rehabilitation. 

Here is the abstract

Purpose The World Report on Disability is an important milestone in the recognition of people with disabilities; however, the Report acknowledges that people with communication difficulties may be underrepresented in estimates of disability. Consequently, this paper applies the nine recommendations from the World Report on Disability to supporting children’s communication skills.
Method Australia is similar to most Minority World countries since it places high regard on articulate and literate communication. Recent large-scale Australian studies of children with speech, language, and communication needs were reviewed to determine prevalence, impact, and associated environmental and personal factors. Studies of met and unmet need were reviewed and discussed in relation to legislation and policies.
Results Recent years have seen improvements in the collection of and access to disability data about children’s communication, including the involvement of children in research about the impact of communication difficulties on their lives. The prevalence of speech and language impairment in children is high and is associated with poorer educational and social outcomes at school-age. Significant unmet need for services was noted, and there were differences in health, education, and disability policies regarding access to services.
Conclusions Updated legislation, policies, and practices are needed to more effectively support access to services to support children’s communication across health, education, and disability sectors.

World Report on Disability article third most downloaded on informahealthcare site

This morning I received an  email from Therese Franzén, Senior Managing Editor, informahealthcare in Sweden regarding the lead article in the recent special issue of International Journal of Speech-Language Pathology titled “The World Report on Disability and people with communication disability” (http://informahealthcare.com/toc/asl/15/1).

She wrote:

“Changing practice: Implications of the World Report on Disability for responding to communication disability in under-served populations, published in the latest issue of IJSLP was the 3^rd most downloaded article on the entire informahealthcare.com site during January. It was accessed 448 times during this month, which would have placed it on a 5^th place on the list of most downloaded articles 2012 (based on full year statistics).” There are more than 160 journals published by informahealthcare.

Congratulations to the authors: Karen Wylie, Lindy McAllister, Bronwyn Davidson and Julie Marshall for their very important contribution to the discussion about both the World Report on Disability, and about underserved populations with communication disability.

For more information about the issue see this previous post.

The World Report on Disability and people with communication disability

The International Journal of Speech-Language Pathology has published a scientific forum titled: World Report on Disability and People with Communication Disability.
The issue can be found here: http://informahealthcare.com/toc/asl/15/1

The issue contains papers about people in Australia, Bolivia, Brazil, Ghana, India, Malaysia, Togo, South Africa, UK, Uganda, US, and VietNam and addresses many issues about underserved populations (including migrants and Indigenous people). The final paper by McAllister et al. summarizes all of the response papers and recommends a way forward for working with people with communication disability throughout the world. I thank Karen Wylie (Ghana), Lindy McAllister (Australia), Bronwyn Davidson (Australia), and Julie Marshall (UK) for their vision for this special issue, and for their hard work in pulling it together.
The contents are as follow

Lead article
Changing practice: Implications of the World Report on Disability for responding to communication disability in underserved populations

Karen Wylie, Lindy McAllister, Bronwyn Davidson, and Julie Marshall

Commentaries

Widening the SLP lens: How can we improve the wellbeing of people with communication disabilities globally?

Mary Wickenden                                                               

The World Report on Disability and communication disability: Some considerations from an Indian context

Juliet Goldbart and Reena Sen

Defining communication disability in underserved communities in response to the World Report on Disability

Sue Roulstone and Sam Harding

A perspective from Bolivia on the implications of the World Report on Disability for people with communication disabilities

Susan Buell

Addressing education of speech-language pathologists in the World Report on Disability: Development of a speech-language pathology program in Malaysia

Kartini Ahmad, Hasherah Ibrahim, Basyariatul Fathi Othman, and Etain Vong

The World Report on Disability in relation to the development of speech-language pathology in Viet Nam

Marie Atherton, Nguyễn Thị Ngọc Dung, and Võ Hoàng Nhân 

Implementation of the World Report on Disability: Developing human resource capacity to meet the needs of people with communication disability in Uganda

Helen Barrett and Julie Marshall

Collaborations to address barriers for people with communication disabilities in Ghana: Considering the World Report on Disability

Catherine Crowley, Miriam Baigorri, Clement Ntim, Belinda Bukari, Albert Oseibagyina, Emmanuel Kitcher, Albert Paintsil, Opoku Ware Ampomah, and Anthony Laing

A French-speaking speech-language pathology program in West Africa: Transfer of training between Minority and Majority World countries

Sylvia Topouzkhanian and Moustafa Mijiyawa

Knowledge transfer between Minority and Majority World settings and its application to the World Report on Disability

Li-Rong Lilly Cheng

Responding to the World Report on Disability in Australia: Lessons from collaboration in an urban Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander school

Bronwyn Davidson, Anne E. Hill, and Alison Nelson

Involving people with communication disability in research in Uganda:  A response to the World Report on Disability

Isla Jones, Julie Marshall, Rebecca Lawthom, and Jennifer Read

Can the subaltern speak? Visibility of international migrants with communication and swallowing disabilities in the World Report on Disability

Mershen Pillay

Promoting change through political consciousness: A South African speech-language pathology response to the World Report on Disability

Harsha Kathard and Mershen Pillay

Implementing the World Report on Disability in Malaysia: A student-led service promoting knowledge and innovation

Sandra Van Dort, Julia Coyle, Linda Wilson, and Hasherah Mohd Ibrahim

Implementing recommendations of the World Report on Disability for indigenous populations

Carol Westby

“From your own thinking you can’t help us”: Intercultural collaboration to address inequities in services for Indigenous Australians in response to the World Report on Disability

Anne Lowell

The World Report on Disability as a blueprint for international, national, and local aphasia services

Linda E. Worrall, Tami Howe, Anna O’Callaghan, Anne J. Hill, Miranda Rose, Sarah J. Wallace, Tanya Rose, Kyla Brown, Emma Power, Robyn O’Halloran, and Alexia Rohde

Implications of the World Report on Disability for responding to communication disorders in Brazil

Fernanda Dreux M. Fernandes and Mara Behlau

Response
The World Report on Disability: An impetus to reconceptualise services for people with communication disability

Lindy McAllister, Karen Wylie, Bronwyn Davidson, and Julie Marshall