Disabled Health Care Professionals' Diverse, Embodied, and Socially Embedded Experiences

• In Event: Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Across Professions

Abstract

Disabled peoples’ participation in healthcare education is limited by assumptions about disability. Within a critical realist paradigm influenced by grounded theory, this study used interviews to explore the experiences of 56 disabled healthcare students/clinicians. Participants describe experiences of disability in healthcare contexts in terms of characteristics and dimensions of disability – how characteristics interact with factors within healthcare training and practice environments. We profile one dimension of disability experience: visibility. There is extensive heterogeneity related to experiences of disability in healthcare contexts. No two individuals experience the same combination of characteristics and dimensions of disability. A framework for conceptualizing disability experience is presented, through which stakeholders might conceptualize individual, embodied, and socially embedded experiences of disabled healthcare students/clinicians.

Authors

• Laura Y. Bulk, The University of British Columbia

• Julia Tikhonova, The University of British Columbia

• Jennifer Gagnon

• Alfiya Battalova, The University of British Columbia

• Yael Mayer, The University of British Columbia

• Terry Krupa

• Michael Lee

• Laura E. Nimmon, The University of British Columbia

• Tal Jarus, University of British Columbia