News
NEDSAC 2001-2012
If you are looking for information about the National Epidemiologic Study of Autism in Canada (2001-2012), please go to http://www.queensu.ca/nedsac/.
Feature in HSO Newsletter
Hélène Ouellette-Kuntz featured in Health Standards Organization (HSO)’s Newsletter for her role as co-chair of the Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities Services Technical Committee: http://bit.ly/2zB6j7a
Rachel Maislin – MSc Defence
Rachel Maislin successfully defended her MSc Thesis in the School of Rehabilitation Therapy at Queen’s University. Her thesis consisted of an assessment of the needs of agency stakeholders with regard to the development of a community employment initiative. Congratulations Rachel!
H-CARDD Aging Project Study
H-CARDD Aging Project study compared the use of home care services in Ontario among adults with and without IDD over time. Although both groups received similar types of home care services, adults with IDD had much higher rates of admission to home care and at much earlier ages. See the full study here: http://bit.ly/2yF2kDj.
Katherine McKenzie – Position at CIHI
MAPS aging project team member Katherine McKenzie has joined the Pharmaceuticals team at the Canadian Institute for Health Information (CIHI)’s Ottawa branch, working as an analyst with the National Prescription Drug Utilization Information System (NPDUIS) Database.
Shaun Cleaver – Beginning Postdoc
Former MAPS student Shaun Cleaver pursues postdoc in the area of global health disability at McGill: http://bit.ly/2vSeUgA
MCSS KM Speaker Series
On September 22, 2017, Hélène Ouellette-Kuntz and Lynn Martin will be holding a speaker series in Toronto, speaking about their research on the changes experienced by home care users with IDD. For more details, see http://bit.ly/2vxKYds.
Terminology for Persons with IDD
With growing interest in and use of administrative data to study populations of interest, there is a need to ensure that those populations are easily identified in such data. Our new study reveals that modern terminology is not consistently used in health records to identify presence of an IDD. Just under 1% of the home care population had a diagnostic entry related to IDD. Ambiguous terms were most commonly used (61%), and this group tended to be older and less impaired than the group with more acceptable terms used to describe their IDD. See the full study here: https://bit.ly/2DiLIEV
Social Enterprise Workshop
On August 24th Dr. Rosemary Lysaght gave a presentation to staff from multiple Ontario ministries as part of a workshop on social enterprise sponsored by the Ministry of Economic Development & Growth. Goals of the workshop were to Illustrate the benefits of social enterprise versus more traditional service delivery organizations, highlight new research on social enterprise and social finance, and explore opportunities for Ontario Public Service staff to support social enterprises. Rosemary’s presentation focused on best practices and emerging needs identified in her past and current research, much of which was collected during a Ministry of Community and Social Services sponsored study on social enterprise in the IDD sector. Participants discussed challenges to social enterprise development and growth, and government actions that could help move this form of employment generation forward.
Ethical Factors With New Technologies
Dr. Virginie Cobigo and her team are working on an innovative transdisciplinary research and development project (WP8.3 PRIV-SENSE). The aim is to study ethical factors that arise during the development, commercialization, diffusion and adoption of a technology, which assists aging persons with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD) and their caregivers in the safe use of medications. In addition to interviews with relevant stakeholder groups (i.e., healthcare professionals and policy makers) and monitoring data via meeting notes and the researcher’s diaries, this inclusive project engages 6 aging persons with IDD who attended 5 focus groups. During the focus groups, the participants helped the technology developers identify the required features and functionalities of the proposed technology application, and tested the prototype. Currently, data are being analyzed and important insights on the ethical issues related to technology adoption and development for/by aging persons with IDD are expected. A first article was accepted and is to be published in the fall of 2017 in the journal of “Ethics and Behaviour”. It explores privacy protection behaviours and attitudes of aging persons with IDD when using information technologies. This 5-year project is funded by AGE-WELL NCE- a national research network in technology and aging, with a span of 25 universities and research centres across Canada, and more than 80 industry, government, and not-for-profit partners.