Improving the Health of Women with Physical Disabilities

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The aim of this application is to produce a book-length document that will present the current state of knowledge on the health of women with disabilities and recommendations for research, education, and practice. The document will be the final product of an extensive project that is being undertaken to solicit information and recommendations from researchers, clinicians, and women with disabilities. The objectives of this project are: 1) Experts in the topic areas of a) reproductive health, b) psychosocial health, c) health promotion/secondary conditions, and d) access to health care for women with disabilities, will produce white papers presenting the state of the science in research, clinical and community interventions, and professional and consumer education, with recommendations for funded research priorities. 2) White papers will be disseminated widely to researchers, women with disabilities, health care professionals, educators, and public health administrators for comment. 3) Representatives of researchers in the health of women with disabilities, federal and private funding agencies, and women with disabilities themselves, will convene to discuss and develop recommendations for research, professional and consumer education, and clinical practice in these areas. 4) A document summarizing the state of knowledge in each of these areas and recommended priorities for research, professional and consumer education, and clinical practice will be produced and distributed to researchers, consumers, health care providers, public health policy makers, and federal and private funding agencies. The Center for Research on Women with Disabilities has been integrally involved with a series of activities that have taken place since 1992 to stimulate research in this neglected area. By tapping into this network of researchers, health care professionals, and consumers, they will convene and facilitate work groups in each of the four designated topic areas to produce white papers. The groups will meet via internet and teleconference communication. The Baylor College of Medicine Office of Public Affairs will send announcements through the media that these papers will be posted for comment on the internet and disseminated in hard copy to individuals and organizations expressing an interest in participating in this process. At a symposium funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Ethel Louise Armstrong Foundation that will take place in Houston in Spring, 2002, invited participants will discuss these papers and comments from the field. Members of the work groups will then expand the white papers into book chapters for each sub-topic area. These chapters will critically review the literature; comment on the effect of culture literacy, and poverty; relate the information to the objectives of Healthy People 2010; discuss implications for public health care policy; present discussions from the symposium; and offer recommendations for research, education, and clinical practice. The final document will be published by a publisher of national reputation, with announcements of its availability disseminated to researchers, educators, clinicians, and consumers nationally and internationally.