Guidelines on the Provision of Manual Wheelchairs in Less Resourced Settings


Book Description

The guidelines focus on manual wheelchairs and the needs of long-term wheelchair users. The recommendations are targeted at those involved in wheelchair services, ranging from design and planning, to providing or supplying wheelchairs and their maintenance.




Wheelchair provision guidelines


Book Description

These Wheelchair provision guidelines aim to support improved accessto appropriate wheelchairs, for all those in need, including children, older persons, people with mobility disabilities, and those with chronic health conditions. They are relevant for all countries and apply to all wheelchair users and types of wheelchairs. They emphasize that the best outcomes in wheelchair access occur when wheelchair users have the benefit of an individual process of assessment, fitting, training and follow up, provided by trained personnel. Their purpose is to ensure that wheelchair users have timely access through wheelchair services that are people-centred and responsive to their needs. Target audiences are those with a role in planning, delivery, monitoring and evaluation of wheelchair provision. This includes policy-makers, wheelchair service personnel, and wheelchair user representative organizations.




Wheelchair Skills Assessment and Training


Book Description

This book provides a wide spectrum of readers with comprehensive but easily understandable protocols for the assessment and training of wheelchair skills. The Wheelchair Research Team at Dalhousie University and the Capital District Health Authority in Halifax (lead by the author) have focused on wheelchair safety and performance for three decades, as exemplified through the Wheelchair Skills Program. This is considered the top such program in the world. This new book is largely based on this program which has been accessed and utilized by over 75,000 people in 177 countries since 2007.




Community-based Rehabilitation


Book Description

Volume numbers determined from Scope of the guidelines, p. 12-13.




The Promise of Assistive Technology to Enhance Activity and Work Participation


Book Description

The U.S. Census Bureau has reported that 56.7 million Americans had some type of disability in 2010, which represents 18.7 percent of the civilian noninstitutionalized population included in the 2010 Survey of Income and Program Participation. The U.S. Social Security Administration (SSA) provides disability benefits through the Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) program and the Supplemental Security Income (SSI) program. As of December 2015, approximately 11 million individuals were SSDI beneficiaries, and about 8 million were SSI beneficiaries. SSA currently considers assistive devices in the nonmedical and medical areas of its program guidelines. During determinations of substantial gainful activity and income eligibility for SSI benefits, the reasonable cost of items, devices, or services applicants need to enable them to work with their impairment is subtracted from eligible earnings, even if those items or services are used for activities of daily living in addition to work. In addition, SSA considers assistive devices in its medical disability determination process and assessment of work capacity. The Promise of Assistive Technology to Enhance Activity and Work Participation provides an analysis of selected assistive products and technologies, including wheeled and seated mobility devices, upper-extremity prostheses, and products and technologies selected by the committee that pertain to hearing and to communication and speech in adults.




Ambient Intelligence for Health


Book Description

This book constitutes the refereed conference proceedings of the First International Conference on Ambient Intelligence for Health, AmIHEALTH 2015, held in Puerto Varas, Chile, in December 2015. The 20 revised full papers and 9 short papers were reviewed and selected from 32 submissions and cover topics on technologies for implementing AmIHealth environments; frameworks related with AmIHealth environments; applied algorithms in e-Health systems; interactions within the AmIHealth environments; applications and case studies of AmIHealth environments; and metrics for health environments.




The Role of Assistive Technology in Fostering Inclusive Education


Book Description

The Role of Assistive Technology in Fostering Inclusive Education uses evidence-based research to explore issues related to implementation of ICT-based Assistive Technology (ICT-AT) in education. It focuses on programmes and activities that aim at the empowerment of the learners with disabilities, as well as the empowerment of the entire educational ecosystem. The book provides a synthesis of political and theoretical discussions as well as practical experiences on the implementation of ICT-AT in education. Analysing international policy frameworks in relation to inclusive education and technology, it discusses examples of school self-assessment and action plan methodologies for digital inclusive education, as well as case studies of innovative ICT and AT solutions in educational environments. The authors elaborate on digital empowerment as a wider societal challenge through reflection on the barriers that people with disabilities meet in education and beyond. This book will be of great interest for academics, researchers, and postgraduate students in the fields of inclusive education and assistive technology, as well as those interested in education research and policy development.




The Routledge Handbook of Disability in Southern Africa


Book Description

This comprehensive ground-breaking southern African-centred collection spans the breadth of disability research and practice. Reputable and emerging scholars, together with disability advocates adopt a critical and interdisciplinary stance to prove, challenge and shift commonly held social understanding of disability in traditional discourses, frontiers and practices in prominent areas such as inter/national development, disability studies, education, culture, health, religion, gender, sports, tourism, ICT, theatre, media , housing and legislation. This handbook provides a body of interdisciplinary analyses suitable for the development of disability studies in southern Africa. Through drawing upon and introducing resources from several disciplines, theoretical perspectives and personal narratives from disability activists, it reflects on disability and sustainable development in southern Africa. It also addresses a clear need to bring together interdisciplinary perspectives and narratives on disability and sustainable development in ways that do not undermine disability politics advanced by disabled people across the world. The handbook further acknowledges and builds upon the huge body of literature that understands the social, cultural, educational, psychological, economic, historical and political facets of the exclusion of disabled people. The handbook covers the following broad themes: • Disability inclusion, ICT and sustainable development • Access to education, from early childhood development up to higher education • Disability, employment, entrepreneurship and community-based rehabilitation • Religion, gender and parenthood • Tourism, sports and accessibility • Compelling narratives from disability activists on societal attitudes toward disability, media advocacy, accessible housing and social exclusion. Thus, this much-awaited handbook provides students, academics, practitioners, development partners, policy makers and activists with an authoritative framework for critical thinking and debates that inform policy and practice in incomparable ways, with the view to promoting inclusive and sustainable development.




Advances in Ergonomics in Design


Book Description

This book provides readers with a timely snapshot of ergonomics research and methods applied to design, development, prototyping, as well as evaluation, training and manufacturing of products, systems and services. It includes theoretical contributions, case studies, and reports on technical interventions. The book covers a wide range of topics in ergonomic design, such as ecological design, educational and game design, cultural and ethical aspects in design, user research and human-computer-interaction in design, as well as design for accessibility and extreme environments, and many others. The book gives special emphasis to new technologies such as virtual reality, state-of-the-art methodologies in information design, and human-computer interfaces. Based on the AHFE 2016 International Conference on Ergonomics in Design, held on July 27-31, 2016, in Walt Disney World®, Florida, USA, this book represents a timely guide for both researcher and design practitioners, including industrial designers, human-computer interaction and user experience researchers, production engineers and applied psychologists.




Advances in Design for Inclusion


Book Description

This book addresses a range of topics in design, such as universal design; design for all; digital inclusion; universal usability; and accessibility of technologies regardless of users’ age, financial situation, education, geographic location, culture and language. It especially focuses on accessibility for people with auditory, cognitive, neurological, and visual impairments, ageing populations, and mobility for those with special physical needs. The book explores some of the overlaps between inclusive design and web accessibility to help managers, designers, developers, policy makers, and researchers optimize their efforts in these areas. Based on the AHFE 2019 International Conference on Design for Inclusion, held on July 24-28, held in Washington D.C., USA, it discusses new design technologies and highlights the disparate needs of the individuals within a community. Thanks to its multidisciplinary approach, it provides readers with various backgrounds with a timely, practice-oriented guide to design for inclusion.