Communication barriers that affect medication adherence in patients with learning disabilities

Having a disability that affects communication can cause particular problems in primary care as inadequate communication can lead to the wrong diagnosis, poor assessments and inadequate health care ( Murphy, 2006 ). All patients are entitled to accessible and appropriate information on prescribed medication to facilitate a deeper understanding of the benefits and harms of treatment ( Grime et al, 2007 ). Reasonable adjustments should be made for learning difficultly patients and this can be in the form of easy reads guides that incorporate larger text, simple information and pictural explanations. Communication passports are a tool used by learning disabled patients, these provide both a practical and person-centred approach to passing on key information about people with complex communication difficulties ( Nursing Times, 2018 ). They provide information about the communication needs and health needs of a patient which is useful to assist in bridging the communication gap between nurse practitioner and patient. In a time of technological advancements, a move towards digital passports would be more beneficial with regular updates from the multidisciplinary team. This in turn can be shared across numerous health platforms the patient might come into contact with, allowing the nurse practitioner to better prepare for the patient prior to their consultation. Education on learning disabilities is an area of training that is lacking in general practice, there have been no provisions made to make the training mandatory. Incorporating mandatory yearly staff training will ensure nurse practitioners have the tools and knowledge to adapt communication techniques during a consultation.

Impediments to effective utilization of assistive technology for learning disabled

BACKGROUND: Assistive technology has been a boon for children with specific learning disabilities (SLDs) as it bridges the gap between them and their peers without SLDs. Despite the vast emphasis on the use of AT and speedy propagation of AT tools, yet more research is required on actual usage of AT. OBJECTIVE: The purpose of the study is to identify the most significant barriers to the usage of AT by children with specific learning disabilities and suggest various measures to deal with it. METHODS: To accomplish the study interviews were conducted with special education teachers of schools in India to find out the major barriers toward the utilisation of AT. First, Qualitative analysis was performed using CAQDAS tool QDA Miner Lite to identify the barriers towards effective utilisation of AT. Further, ISM technique and MICAMAC analysis were used to corroborate the most significant barriers. RESULTS: The results revealed the most significant barriers to implementation of AT and also that timely managing these major barriers can lower the effect on other barriers. CONCLUSION: Eliminating the significant barriers would enhance the use of AT by the special education teachers, parents, and children with SLDs. Effective use of AT can prove to be benediction in the times of pandemic.

Recipe for a Good Life

Recipe for a Good Life (2019) was an art exhibition at the Brindley in Cheshire which explored what it means to live a “good life” to local learning disabled people. Curated by self-advocate Leah Jones, it featured artworks created via a public participatory arts programme, where self-advocates, SEND schools, disability professionals, families, carers, and gallery visitors came together to share their different visions of what living a good life meant to them. This article documents and reflects on this exhibition using a life story approach. By describing the exhibition from Leah’s own perspective, this article offers an account of how this exhibition was curated, and furthermore, how her curatorial work and life as a self-advocate intersect, demonstrating the important role people with learning disabilities have the potential to play in culture as artists, communicators, and curators.

Panarchy 3: River of the Sea

The article reflects critically on Panarchy 3: River of the Sea, a learning-disabled-led ecological performance project that evolved in connection with the River Clyde from 2018 to 2019. River of the Sea was a collaboration between The Panarchy Projects at the University of Glasgow and the Friday Club at the Citizens’ Theatre in Glasgow. The Friday Club is a learning-disabled theatre group with fifteen members that meets once a week to socialize and develop performance skills, and The Panarchy Projects are an ongoing series of neurodivergent-led, ecological, and theatre-based research projects. The article introduces the exploratory praxis of the River of the Sea project, which combines theatre practice as research method with participatory action research methods within an expanded ecological field. It then analyses the findings, insights, and accounts of experience which were generated through this praxis and shared in two very different performance events. The article ends by discussing these findings, suggesting that learning-disabled-led ecological performance practices, such as those explored in the River of the Sea project, can support aesthetic experimentation, and nurture solidarity. The article hopes to contribute to the development of what Alison Kafer has called a “cripped environmentalism” (131), and to the building of a bridge between learning disability and environmental discourses.

A cooptação neocolonial da agência por meio da patologização da pobreza, da diversidade e da desigualdade nos EUA e como enfrentá-la com uma educação ativista transformadora

Este trabalho aborda a relação entre a patologização dos(as) estudantes oriundos(as) da classe trabalhadora, de imigrantes e de minorias étnico-raciais nos Estados Unidos e a cooptação da agência dessa população historicamente explorada e submetida a opressões sociais e educacionais. Para isso, utilizamos a concepção de agência desde o Posicionamento Ativista Transformador (Transformative Activist Stance – TAS), desenvolvido por Stetsenko (2017), a filosofia da práxis em Marx (1989), a teoria histórico-cultural de Vygotsky (2002) e a perspectiva anticolonialista de Freire (2019) e Quijano (2019). Primeiramente, apresentamos as condições de vida e de trabalho de estudantes vulneráveis e latinos(as) em Nova York e nos Estados Unidos, depois tratamos um conjunto de discussões teóricas oriundas de pesquisas sobre o contexto da patologização da pobreza, do déficit, da diferença e da desigualdade social. Em seguida, apresentamos as histórias de vida e de escolarização de estudantes do Community College da City University of New York (CUNY) diagnosticados(as) como deficientes de aprendizagem e a sua luta dentro do sistema educacional americano. O processo de patologização daqueles(as) que não se enquadram no padrão branco e supremacista norte-americano culmina numa nova forma de colonialismo (o Sul dentro do Norte Global), resultante na cooptação da agência crítica e transformadora daqueles(as) que, a priori, poderiam ser o motor da transformação do sistema escolar que os(as) oprime.Palavras-chave: Neocolonialismo. Deficiência. Agência. Educação. Abstract: This work addresses the relationship between the pathologization of students from the working class, immigrants and ethnic-racial minorities in the United States and the co-optation of the agency of this historically exploited population and subjected to social and educational oppression. For this, we used the concept of agency from the Transformative Activist Stance (TAS), developed by Stetsenko (2017), the philosophy of praxis in Marx (1989), the historical-cultural theory of Vygotsky (2002) and the anti-colonialist perspective of Freire (2019) and Quijano (2019). First, we present the living and working conditions of vulnerable students, especially Latinos, in New York and the United States, then we discuss a set of theoretical issues arising from research on the context of the pathologization of poverty, deficit, difference and social inequality. Next, we present the life and schooling histories 2 ? of students from a Community College at City University of New York (CUNY) diagnosed as learning disabled and their struggle within the American educational system. Our aim is to reveal how how the pathologization process produces students who come to “not fit in” the North American White supremacist sociocultural standard, which amounts to a new form of colonialism (the South within the Global North), resulting in the co-optation of the critical and transformative agency of precisely of the marginalized who, potentially, are uniquely positioned to be the engine of the transformation of the school system that oppresses them.Keywords: Neocolonialism. Deficiency. Agency. Education.