Makwena M. Sibuyi, Desmond Mathye, Muziwakhe D. Tshabalala
et al.
Background: Challenges persist in implementing the policy to Screen, Identify, Assess, and Support (SIAS) individuals with physical disabilities, particularly in rural provinces of South Africa. The challenges are compounded by the existing imbalance in the distribution of physiotherapists where the majority work in the health sector. However, physiotherapists are well-equipped to assess functional limitations and adapt school environments to support inclusive learning and participation.
Objectives: The study explored the challenges physiotherapists experienced in implementing the policy to SIAS learners with physical disabilities.
Method: Seven physiotherapists employed by the provincial Department of Education participated in a qualitative, single exploratory case study utilising virtual focus group discussions. Data were analysed with a six-step approach to inductive thematic data analysis on ATLAS.ti version 19 software.
Results: Two overarching themes with sub-themes emerged: (1) Poor knowledge of the SIAS policy as a result of lack of in-service training and fear of transfers through the Rationalisation and Redeployment policy; and (2) lack of interprofessional collaboration because of unclear roles and responsibilities, and absence of support structures with regard to the School-Based Support Teams, Circuit-Based Support Teams, and District-Based Support Teams.
Conclusion: Ongoing in-service training, defining roles and responsibilities of physiotherapists and improving the functioning of support structures are essential for effective policy implementation.
Contribution: The study bridges the gap in research on the participation of physiotherapists within the SIAS policy framework. Participation of physiotherapists would optimise support for learners and improve educational outcomes.
Vocational rehabilitation. Employment of people with disabilities, Communities. Classes. Races
Large Language Models (LLMs) are increasingly used for mental health support, yet little is known about how people with mental health challenges engage with them, how they evaluate their usefulness, and what design opportunities they envision. We conducted 20 semi-structured interviews with people in the UK who live with mental health conditions and have used LLMs for mental health support. Through reflexive thematic analysis, we found that participants engaged with LLMs in conditional and situational ways: for immediacy, the desire for non-judgement, self-paced disclosure, cognitive reframing, and relational engagement. Simultaneously, participants articulated clear boundaries informed by prior therapeutic experience: LLMs were effective for mild-to-moderate distress but inadequate for crises, trauma, and complex social-emotional situations. We contribute empirical insights into the lived use of LLMs for mental health, highlight boundary-setting as central to their safe role, and propose design and governance directions for embedding them responsibly within care ecosystem.
Jake Chanenson, Tara Matthews, Sunny Consolvo
et al.
Online financial scams represent a long-standing and serious threat for which people seek help. We present a study to understand people's in situ motivations for engaging with scams and the help needs they express before, during, and after encountering a scam. We identify the main emotions scammers exploited (e.g., fear, hope) and characterize how they did so. We examine factors -- such as financial insecurity and legal precarity -- which elevate people's risk of engaging with specific scams and experiencing harm. We indicate when people sought help and describe their help-seeking needs and emotions at different stages of the scam. We discuss how these needs could be met through the design of contextually-specific prevention, diagnostic, mitigation, and recovery interventions.
Luana Pereira Oliveira Gonçalves, Isabella Pessóta Sudati, Ana Paula Zanardi da Silva
et al.
The Mobility Intensive Training (Mob-IT) protocol is an innovative intervention focused on motor learning to improve the mobility of children with cerebral palsy (CP). The objective was to describe the feasibility and intervention fidelity of Mob-IT. A single-subject experimental study was conducted with four children with CP, a median age of 11 (7–13) years, and a Gross Motor Function Classification System I–III. The Mob-IT included 24 h of practice of mobility goals, delivered three times a week in 2 h sessions over four weeks. Feasibility was assessed using the Qualitative Feedback Questionnaire (QFQ), evaluating adherence, acceptability, adverse effects, the clarity of procedures, and intervention time. The Canadian Occupational Performance Measure (COPM) was used to assess participant and caregiver satisfaction. Fidelity was measured by the type of feedback provided (intrinsic vs. extrinsic), task challenge level, and intervention volume. Participants reported good acceptance, few adverse effects, and satisfaction with the outcomes. The intervention adhered to the proposed principles, with a focus on extrinsic feedback and tasks showing progression over time. Time was well spent, being 78% focused on activities and using mostly extrinsic-focused feedback. The Mob-IT protocol was considered feasible and faithful to its principles. As this is a feasibility study, the results indicate the need to expand the intervention to a larger, randomized study.
Vocational rehabilitation. Employment of people with disabilities
Youth with disabilities face persistent disability-related discrimination (ableism) but research frequently overlooks the experiences of racially minoritized youth. The purpose of our study was to explore the experiences and perceived impact of discrimination among racially minoritized youth and young adults with disabilities. This qualitative study involved a sample of 15 youth and young adults with disabilities (mean age 22 years) identifying as racially minoritized. A descriptive inductive thematic analysis was applied to the interview data. Our findings highlighted the following themes: (1) types of discrimination (i.e., cultural and family-related ableism, racist ableism, and gendered/sexist ableism); (2) perceived impact of discrimination (i.e., social isolation, avoidance of unwelcoming and unsafe situations, impact on physical and mental health, decisions about identity disclosure, and a lack of access to resources and opportunities); and (3) positive coping strategies (i.e., inclusive and safe spaces, self-advocacy, and social and family supports).
Vocational rehabilitation. Employment of people with disabilities
Abdulrahman A. Alsayegh, Azza A. Al Areefy, Mohamed M. Ahmed
Children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) experience negative effects on their everyday activities due to cognitive and motor disabilities. Physiotherapy treatment plans aim to reduce body structure and function impairments, promote developmental sequence, and facilitate milestones, while gluten-free casein-free (GFCF) diets have been proven effective in improving autism symptoms. So, the purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of a combined GFCF diet and neurodevelopmental (NDT) physical therapy program on the gross motor development and cognition of children with ASDs. Eighty children with ASD were distributed into four groups: A, for diet intervention; B, for physical therapy; C, for combined diet and physical therapy; and D was the control group. The evaluation was performed using gross motor functional measures and Stanford–Binet V5 before and after intervention. Intervention continued for 3 months for the children with ASD in the Jazan region, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Group A showed non-significant change for both gross motor ( P = 0.89) and cognition ( P = 0.53) functions, Groups B and C revealed significant improvement for both gross motor [mean difference (MD) = −12.77, 14.61] and cognition (MD = −14.2, 14.55), respectively, with ( P = 0.001), and finally Group D showed no significant change for both gross motor ( P = 0.65) and cognition ( P = 0.16). Gross motor development and cognitive function of children with ASD significantly improved with the combination of the GFCF diet and NDT physical therapy program, with significant improvement with the NDT physical therapy alone on gross motor development and cognition, while using the GFCF diet alone had no change.
Vocational rehabilitation. Employment of people with disabilities
Vladimir Vukovic, Kate Sykes, Oliwia Kowalczyk
et al.
<i>Background</i>: People with intellectual disabilities, in comparison to the general population, face multiple health inequalities and poor health outcomes. Service organisations for people with intellectual disabilities are one of the key players in ensuring that people with intellectual disabilities have access to adequate healthcare. <i>Methods</i>: A cross-sectional web-based survey was implemented from 8 to 22 April 2025, focusing on organisations providing services to people with intellectual disabilities, with a peak response rate of 9%. The survey comprised 29 questions, split into three sections: general information, experience, and opinions on cancer prevention policy. <i>Results</i>: A total of 29 organisations from 14 upper-middle- and high-income European countries participated. Approximately 20% (n = 6) of organisations reported the existence of a cancer prevention policy in their country designed to address the needs of people with intellectual disabilities, with most considering them inadequate. Overall, 86.2% of organisations identified tailoring cancer prevention policy for people with intellectual disabilities to be of major importance. Respondents identified national government/ministries (n = 26, 90%), organisations for people with intellectual disabilities (n = 24, 82.8%), and research entities (n = 23, 79.3%) as the responsible stakeholders for implementing policy changes. <i>Conclusions</i>: Respondents expressed strong support for tailored policies, alongside support for a pan-European approach. From a policy perspective, findings support the critical need for policymakers to prioritise cancer prevention strategies, improve coordination, and ensure training and co-production with organisations supporting people with intellectual disabilities.
Vocational rehabilitation. Employment of people with disabilities
Mahin Vazifehdan, Pietro Bosoni, Daniele Pala
et al.
Multiple Sclerosis (MS) is a chronic disease characterized by progressive or alternate impairment of neurological functions (motor, sensory, visual, and cognitive). Predicting disease progression with a probabilistic and time-dependent approach might help in suggesting interventions that can delay the progression of the disease. However, extracting informative knowledge from irregularly collected longitudinal data is difficult, and missing data pose significant challenges. MS progression is measured through the Expanded Disability Status Scale (EDSS), which quantifies and monitors disability in MS over time. EDSS assesses impairment in eight functional systems (FS). Frequently, only the EDSS score assigned by clinicians is reported, while FS sub-scores are missing. Imputing these scores might be useful, especially to stratify patients according to their phenotype assessed over the disease progression. This study aimed at i) exploring different methodologies for imputing missing FS sub-scores, and ii) predicting the EDSS score using complete clinical data. Results show that Exponential Weighted Moving Average achieved the lowest error rate in the missing data imputation task; furthermore, the combination of Classification and Regression Trees for the imputation and SVM for the prediction task obtained the best accuracy.
Juliana Jansen Ferreira, Vinícius Segura, Joana Gabriela Souza
et al.
People face overwhelming information during work activities, necessitating effective organization and management strategies. Even in personal lives, individuals must keep, annotate, organize, and retrieve knowledge from daily routines. The collection of records for future reference is known as a personal knowledge base. Note-taking applications are valuable tools for building and maintaining these bases, often called a ''second brain''. This paper presents a case study on how people build and explore personal knowledge bases for various purposes. We selected the note-taking tool Obsidian and researchers from a Brazilian lab for an in-depth investigation. Our investigation reveals interesting findings about how researchers build and explore their personal knowledge bases. A key finding is that participants' knowledge retrieval strategy influences how they build and maintain their content. We suggest potential features for an AI system to support this process.
Christen Knowles, James Sinclair, Yen K Pham
et al.
Background Finding employment is a complex task and traditional means of job seeking such as submitting a traditional resume may be ineffective and inaccessible for some people with disabilities. Objective Identify the scope of literature related to documenting any outcomes associated with using alternatives to traditional resumes for people with disabilities. Method : A scoping review was conducted, and studies that met inclusion criteria were coded for information on participants and context, type of resume alternative utilized in the study, research design, research quality, and findings. Results Seven studies identified in the scoping met full inclusion criteria. Most studies were non-experimental, focused on the use of video resumes or video CVs, and did not meet American Psychological Association's journal article reporting standards. Results also suggest there are benefits for people with intellectual disability to participate in the process of creating a video resume. Conclusion Challenges securing adequate employment persists for people with disabilities. Research on any benefits of using a resume alternative for people with disabilities is in its infancy. Findings from this scoping review cannot, in conglomeration, confirm that there are benefits when implementing these alternatives, however, findings from this review suggest the use of resume alternatives warrant further investigation.
Parkinson’s disease (PD), first described by James Parkinson, remains the most prevalent neurological movement disorder in aging populations. This debilitating condition is characterized by the progressive degeneration of dopaminergic neurons within the substantia nigra (SN) pars compacta. Despite its discovery over two centuries ago, the etiology of PD remains elusive. To gain deeper insights into the underlying pathology, disease progression mechanisms, and potential therapeutic targets for symptom amelioration, animal models have emerged as invaluable tools. Among these, neurotoxins such as 1-methyl-4-phenyl-1,2,3,6-tetrahydropyridine (MPTP) and 6-hydroxydopamine (6-OHDA) are extensively utilized to induce acute PD models in mice and rats, respectively. This review comprehensively explores the contributions of these neurotoxin-induced models toward enhancing our understanding of PD pathogenesis and advancing therapeutic interventions. Additionally, it highlights key findings and promising avenues for future research in this critical area of movement disorders.
Vocational rehabilitation. Employment of people with disabilities
Annalisa Levante, Chiara Martis, Giuseppe Antonioli
et al.
This paper presents the Early Basketball Protocol, a sports-based intervention designed to improve motor and socio-emotional skills in autistic preschoolers. Recognizing the paucity of sports protocols for younger autistic children, we developed this protocol using basketball rules to foster an inclusive setting where autistic preschoolers (<i>n</i> = 4) and their typically developing peers (<i>n</i> = 13) could engage in activities together. The protocol aims to simultaneously develop motor and socio-emotional skills through inclusive sports activities. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the effectiveness of the protocol was evaluated using parent-reported measures. A narrative approach synthesized the parental answers, and a pre–post-test analysis evaluated the preliminary application of the EB protocol based on parent-reported perceptions. Encouraging longitudinal results emerged, particularly in the improvement of socio-emotional skills for all participants. However, the early disruption of activities due to the pandemic may have contributed to the lack of improvement in gross motor skills. The paper discusses the practical implications of these findings and outlines future research directions, emphasizing the critical role of social inclusion.
Vocational rehabilitation. Employment of people with disabilities
Crescentia Jung, Jazmin Collins, Ricardo E. Gonzalez Penuela
et al.
Social VR has increased in popularity due to its affordances for rich, embodied, and nonverbal communication. However, nonverbal communication remains inaccessible for blind and low vision people in social VR. We designed accessible cues with audio and haptics to represent three nonverbal behaviors: eye contact, head shaking, and head nodding. We evaluated these cues in real-time conversation tasks where 16 blind and low vision participants conversed with two other users in VR. We found that the cues were effective in supporting conversations in VR. Participants had statistically significantly higher scores for accuracy and confidence in detecting attention during conversations with the cues than without. We also found that participants had a range of preferences and uses for the cues, such as learning social norms. We present design implications for handling additional cues in the future, such as the challenges of incorporating AI. Through this work, we take a step towards making interpersonal embodied interactions in VR fully accessible for blind and low vision people.
Lucas Godoy Garraza, Ilene Speizer, Leontine Alkema
There is interest in learning about the causal effect of family planning (FP) on empowerment related outcomes. Experimental data related to this question are available from trials in which FP programs increase access to FP. While program assignment is unconfounded, FP uptake and subsequent empowerment may share common causes. We use principal stratification to estimate the causal effect of an intermediate FP outcome on a primary outcome of interest, among women affected by a FP program. Within strata defined by the potential reaction to the program, FP uptake is unconfounded. To minimize the need for parametric assumptions, we propose to use Bayesian Additive Regression Trees (BART) for modeling stratum membership and outcomes of interest. We refer to the combined approach as Prince BART. We evaluate Prince BART through a simulation study and use it to assess the causal effect of modern contraceptive use on employment in six cities in Nigeria, based on quasi-experimental data from a FP program trial during the first half of the 2010s. We show that findings differ between Prince BART and alternative modeling approaches based on parametric assumptions.
Calculating mealtime insulin doses poses a significant challenge for individuals with Type 1 Diabetes (T1D). Doses should perfectly compensate for expected post-meal glucose excursions, requiring a profound understanding of the individual's insulin sensitivity and the meal macronutrients'. Usually, people rely on intuition and experience to develop this understanding. In this work, we demonstrate how a reinforcement learning agent, employing a self-attention encoder network, can effectively mimic and enhance this intuitive process. Trained on 80 virtual subjects from the FDA-approved UVA/Padova T1D adult cohort and tested on twenty, self-attention demonstrates superior performance compared to other network architectures. Results reveal a significant reduction in glycemic risk, from 16.5 to 9.6 in scenarios using sensor-augmented pump and from 9.1 to 6.7 in scenarios using automated insulin delivery. This new paradigm bypasses conventional therapy parameters, offering the potential to simplify treatment and promising improved quality of life and glycemic outcomes for people with T1D.
Background: Housekeeping profession is regarded as a major workforce. Housekeepers also undertake push-pull jobs that entail biomechanical strain factors such as joint torque, compressive and shear forces, and their influencing variables such as specific muscle activity, body positioning, exertion direction, and workspace environment
Objectives: The aims of this study were to determine the frequency of work-related musculoskeletal disorders among housekeepers, its association with working hours and to determine the area of the body more prone to develop musculoskeletal disorders among housekeepers.
Methodology: A cross-sectional study using a purposive sampling technique was conducted in schools, colleges, universities and hospitals of Islamabad and Rawalpindi from February 2019 to June 2019. After obtaining consent, data was collected from 400 participants through a self-structured questionnaire which included demographics, pain-related questions, Visual Analogue Scale and Nordic musculoskeletal questionnaire. SPSS version 23.0 was used to enter data and for analysis of the data.
Results: A total of 400 participants (male=281, female=119) participated in the study, in which 59% (N=236) had work-related musculoskeletal discomfort. 17.3% of participants reported that the more prone area to pain is the lower back and the least prone areas were head, wrist/hand, upper and mid-back, with the frequency of 0.3%.31.2% participants reported moderate intensity of pain according to visual analogue scale (VAS). There was a non-significant association (p>0.05) between working hours per day and work related musculoskeletal pain.
Conclusion: It is concluded that housekeepers have a high frequency of work-related musculoskeletal disorders. Low back has the highest frequency of pain followed by head, wrist/hand, upper and mid-back. The visual analogue scale shows that most of the housekeepers have moderate intensity of pain. There is a non-significant association of frequency of work related musculoskeletal pain with working hours.
Keywords: Housekeepers, Musculoskeletal Disorders, Work-related musculoskeletal disorders.
Vocational rehabilitation. Employment of people with disabilities, Therapeutics. Psychotherapy
Background: The study is conducted to investigate whether curriculum reform for learners with special education needs (SEN) is taking place in Zambia.
Objectives: The study objective were to investigate the extent to which curriculum had been reformed to facilitate the inclusion of children with SEN in Zambia; and determine stakeholders understanding of inclusive education policy, to evaluate the success of an inclusive programme in supporting the full inclusion of learners with SEN.
Method: This study used a mixed method research design which involved data collection in seven provinces of Zambia. The researchers employed purposive sampling. The largest number of respondents were SEN teachers and administrators. The qualitative data collection tools included semi-structured interviews of individuals and focus groups. The quantitative data came from a questionnaire completed by teachers and supervisors as well as from government documents. The quantitative data were analysed using SOFA Statistics, while the qualitative data were analysed using ATLAS-TI 7.
Results: Limited curriculum reform remains one of the main impediments to the implementation of the inclusive policy for children with SEN in Zambia.
Conclusion: It is concluded that without curriculum reform the implementation of inclusive education in Zambia will be challenging.
Contribution: There is a dearth of information regarding curriculum reform in Zambia. This is one of the studies that is attempting to plug the information gap on curriculum reform.
Vocational rehabilitation. Employment of people with disabilities, Communities. Classes. Races
Hsiang-Wei Huang, Cheng-Yen Yang, Zhongyu Jiang
et al.
Multi-camera multiple people tracking has become an increasingly important area of research due to the growing demand for accurate and efficient indoor people tracking systems, particularly in settings such as retail, healthcare centers, and transit hubs. We proposed a novel multi-camera multiple people tracking method that uses anchor-guided clustering for cross-camera re-identification and spatio-temporal consistency for geometry-based cross-camera ID reassigning. Our approach aims to improve the accuracy of tracking by identifying key features that are unique to every individual and utilizing the overlap of views between cameras to predict accurate trajectories without needing the actual camera parameters. The method has demonstrated robustness and effectiveness in handling both synthetic and real-world data. The proposed method is evaluated on CVPR AI City Challenge 2023 dataset, achieving IDF1 of 95.36% with the first-place ranking in the challenge. The code is available at: https://github.com/ipl-uw/AIC23_Track1_UWIPL_ETRI.
Long-term care service for old people is in great demand in most of the aging societies. The number of nursing homes residents is increasing while the number of care providers is limited. Due to the care worker shortage, care to vulnerable older residents cannot be fully tailored to the unique needs and preference of each individual. This may bring negative impacts on health outcomes and quality of life among institutionalized older people. To improve care quality through personalized care planning and delivery with limited care workforce, we propose a new care planning model assisted by artificial intelligence. We apply bandit algorithms which optimize the clinical decision for care planning by adapting to the sequential feedback from the past decisions. We evaluate the proposed model on empirical data acquired from the Systems for Person-centered Elder Care (SPEC) study, a ICT-enhanced care management program.
This study expands upon the foundation of 'Skill-Relevance-Self Selection' model on labor immigration, introduced by our previous study (Lee, Lim, & Cho, 2022). In detail, we seek an empirical confirmation of the model by providing evidence of the attained -- however, yet to be tested -- stylized fact: 'as the discount of intranational skill-relevance by immigration is intensified, the wage differential of international labor immigration is diminished'. Utilizing the hypothesis and data meticulously formulated and selected in consideration of Employment Permit System (EPS) and the typology of host nations, OLS linear regression results reasonably support all hypotheses with statistical significance, thereby inductively substantiating our constructed model. This paper contributes to existing labor immigration economics literature in three following aspects: (1) Acknowledge the previously overlooked factor of 'skill relevance discount' in labor immigration as an independent parameter, separate from the 'Moving cost' of Borjas model (1987; 1991); (2) Demonstrate the down-to-earth economic implications of host nation typology, thereby establishing a taxonomy in existence, rather than an ideal classification; (3) Seek a complementary synthesis of two grand strands of research methodology -- that is, deductive mathematical modeling and inductive statistical testing.