Missoula seen from above with downtown in the foreground and snowy mountains in the distance

Rural Institute

APHA 2024 Poster

This poster is presented as part of the The Aging and Disability Vaccine Collaborative (ADVC) Project.

Allied health professional students want effective communication training provided by persons with disabilities to improve the quality of vaccinations and other services.

Public health has roles to play in organizing these training experiences.

Presented by:

Tannis Hargrove, MS, CHES (1), Meg Traci, PhD (1), Kenneth Chatriand, PharmD (1), Lindsay Benes, PhD, RN (2), Carissa Russell (1), Emily Coyle, MPH (1), Travis Hoffman (3),  Madison Kelly (1), Faith Dawson, Coreen Faulkner

  1. University of Montana,
  2. Montana State University,
  3. Summit Independent Living

A Collaborative Approach to Improving Healthcare Access for Rural People with Disabilities

Background

  • Rural people with disabilities experience significant healthcare barriers and health disparities.
  • Public health has critical roles to play to remove these barriers and eliminate health disparities with people with disability including planning training programs with local disability advocates and trainee stakeholders.
  • Disability Advisors is a program developed by the Montana Disability and Health Program and community partner organizations such as the Rural Institute and Montana Centers for Independent Living (CILs). Over the past twenty years, this program has recruited, trained and funded more than 40 individuals with disabilities to participate as members of public health planning committees and as trainers in workforce development events.
  • For the current training on effective communication and accessible vaccination and other healthcare services, we collaborated with Disability Advisors and Allied Health Professional Programs.

Methods

  • We organized “Lunch and Learn” events for students in two allied health professions programs – Pharmacy and Physical Therapy – in part, to prepare students to promote vaccines with people with disabilities and older adults.
  • Student leaders and faculty helped plan the events to fit the semester schedule and to meet the interests of students.
  • We recruited Disability Advisors to help plan the agenda for the training and coordinated CART, ASL interpreters and a remote interpreter services for the planning meetings and at the training.
  • We coordinated input from Disability Advisors and the state assistive technology program into a demonstration kit with select assistive technology (AT) equipment items that support effective communication in health care settings (Figure 1).
  • Faculty described how CART, ASL interpreters and remote interpreter services are available in campus health care settings. Faculty demonstrated remote interpreter services. Students were given QR codes to link to live CART transcripts and were trained to understand difference between CART and auto-generated captions.
  • Disability Advisor (professional disabled trainers) demonstrated to allied health students the use of AT equipment and other supports and shared how to support personal preferences for accessible, effective communication and ensure a person’s choice and dignity are elevated in healthcare settings.

Future Directions and Next Steps

  • Prioritize conversations with Disability Advocates over Assistive Technology professional demonstrations
  • Consider Lunch and Learn series to develop relationships and provide opportunities for greater focus on specific topics
  • Explore opportunities for experiential learning funding for future events with these and other allied health programs

“People who have vision, hearing, or speech disabilities (“communication disabilities”) use different ways to communicate. For example, people who are blind may give and receive information audibly rather than in writing and people who are deaf may give and receive information through writing or sign language rather than through speech."

“The ADA requires that title II entities (State and local governments) and title III entities (businesses and nonprofit organizations that serve the public) communicate effectively with people who have communication disabilities. The goal is to ensure that communication with people with these disabilities is equally effective as communication with people without disabilities.”  https://www.ada.gov/resources/effective-communication/

Funding

Funding for participation in this project was made possible by DD21-2103 from DHDD. The views expressed in written Annual Meeting materials or publications and by speakers and moderators do not necessarily reflect the official policies of the Department of Health and Human Services nor does mention of trade names, commercial practices, or organizations imply endorsement by the U.S. Government.

This project was supported by the Administration for Community Living (ACL, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) through USAging as part of a financial assistance award to USAging totaling $74,999,835 with 100 percent funding by ACL/HHS. The contents are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official view of, nor an endorsement, by USAging, ACL/HHS.