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Tackling attitudes of healthcare professionals towards disabled people

Press release issued: 3 October 2005

The University of Bristol, the University of the West of England, Bristol and the Peninsula Medical School have collaborated on a project called Partners in Practice (PiP) to develop a curriculum framework for healthcare students.

- Healthcare students to be given better guidelines -

The University of Bristol, the University of the West of England, Bristol and the Peninsula Medical School have collaborated on a project called Partners in Practice (PiP) to develop a curriculum framework for healthcare students.

PiP spent three years consulting with disabled people, service users, medical and healthcare practitioners, and teaching staff to discover aspects of disability discrimination that are important to the training of doctors, nurses, dentists, midwives and other healthcare professionals.

PiP's research has shown that the greatest barrier disabled people face when accessing healthcare is the negative attitude of some healthcare professionals.

The curriculum framework, called 'Different Differences: disability equality teaching in healthcare education', is aimed at preparing healthcare practitioners to provide greater equality in the treatment of all patients.

The framework has been designed to be flexible enough to suit the needs of all healthcare disciplines and teaching methods and is aimed at helping Higher Education institutions to better prepare healthcare students for their future careers.

More than 160 people were involved in the consultation process, 45 per cent of whom described themselves as disabled.

Pilot projects based on the new framework have been carried out with overwhelming positive feedback from students and staff.

Dr Margaret Byron, from the University of Bristol, said: "The fact that disabled people face discrimination within the healthcare system is beyond dispute.

"The good news is that our curriculum framework, 'Different Differences', offers a wealth of practical ideas to establish and embed disability equality into the heart of the education of all health professionals."

Shekar Bheenuck, who led the UWE part of the project, said: "We hope this new curriculum framework makes a difference to the education and training of healthcare professionals resulting in improved services for and care of disabled people in a genuine spirit of partnership and equality."

Professor Paul Bradley, Director of Clinical Skills at the Peninsula Medical School, said:  "This project has developed learning outcomes for the education of undergraduate health care students related to disability.

"This work has involved health care professionals, health care educators and, most importantly, disabled people.

"These outcomes will represent a core element of undergraduate curricula in an area that has previously received so little attention to the detriment of the health care provided to disabled people.

"This project sets the standards for the required quality of disability equality teaching and learning for the future."

In 2004 the Disability Rights Commission stated that 'Barriers to health services are intolerable for any section of society but particularly so for groups known to be at high risk of premature death and ill health.' PiP's researchers concluded that, while students are taught about the treatment of illness and disease, it is rare that they are taught about disability equality.

With this framework, teachers and curriculum planners now have a practical tool to help them overcome this situation.

The study showed three per cent of women with learning difficulties take up a cervical screening compared with a general uptake of 85 per cent. Profoundly deaf people are four times more likely than hearing people to be diagnosed as psychotic at some time in their lives. Half of people with a mental health condition report being let down by the health service, including physical symptoms not being believed. 70 per cent of GPs do not provide any accessible information for those with learning disabilities.

The Partners in Practice project is funded by the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE) and the Department for Employment and Learning (DEL). 

Peninsula Medical School is a joint School of the Universities of Exeter and Plymouth and admitted its first cohort of undergraduates in 2002.  Research that maps NHS needs and priorities is a vital part of the School's activities. 

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