NDS Topic Areas Research to Action - Easy Read Text Only

What topics would you like to know more about? Please share your ideas

Text-only version

How to use this document

This information is written in an easy to read way.

This document has been written by National Disability Services, or NDS for short. When you see the word we, it means NDS.

Some words are written in bold. We explain what these words mean. There is a list of these words on page 20.

This Easy Read document is a summary of another document.

You can find the other document on our website at https://www.nds.org.au/news/feedback-sought-on-research-to-action-priorities

You can ask for help to read this document. A friend, family member or support person may be able to help you.

Whats in this document?

About our research4

Working together with the health system7

Sharing knowledge about justice and the law8

Helping young people with disability get jobs9

Encouraging employers to offer jobs to people with disability10

Supporting carers11

Encouraging people to be active citizens12

Making sure that services meet peoples cultural needs13

Connecting people in rural and remote areas14

Helping people speak up for themselves15

Being prepared for natural disasters16

Leading healthy lives17

Making sure that research includes everyone18

What do you think?19

Word list20

About our research

The NDS Centre for Applied Research (CADR) is pulling together all the research about disability in Australia.

Over time, we will create an important collection of disability research and resources.

This will be called a Clearing house.

In 2014, the University of Sydney worked on a large study.

This was called the Audit of Disability Research.

It looked at all the research that has been done to date.

The Audit found that the research that exists

did not cover what the community needs to know

is hard to find.

We want to change this.

We want to summarise the research thats out there and make it easier to find.

We want to work out which areas we should focus on first.

This paper explains how you can share your ideas with us.

When we have worked out the best topic areas, we will write a series of guides.

These guides will look at the research to explain:

what works

who it works for

when it works.

What areas should we focus on first?

We know that the disability sector is changing.

And we know that this offers us all a chance to make a real difference in the lives of people with disability.

Research can help us by providing the evidence we need to make change.

However, its hard to know where to start.

The Audit was a great summary of where things are up to now.

And we know that some research is already being summarised in the following areas:

autism

early childhood intervention when people start receiving treatment and therapy early in their lives

housing.

Other people have been working on these areas, so we wont put them on our list of ideas.

Instead, we are thinking about the following areas:

Working together with the health system.

Sharing knowledge about justice and the law.

Helping young people with disability get jobs.

Encouraging people to offer jobs to people with disability.

Supporting carers.

Encouraging people to be active citizens.

Making sure that services meet peoples cultural needs.

Connecting people in rural and remote areas.

Helping people speak up for themselves.

Being prepared for natural disasters.

Leading healthy lives.

Making sure that research includes everyone.

On the following pages, we talk about each of these ideas.

We will look into the research that has been done to answer the questions in each topic.

Working together with the health system

Sometimes, the health system doesnt meet the needs of people with disability.

We want to summarise the research about:

How we can help people with disability find and use health services.

Things that are stopping people get the health services they need.

How support workers can help people find and use health services.

How we can support people to speak up for themselves when they need or use health care services.

Sharing knowledge about justice and the law

A lot of people with disability struggle when it comes to getting fair access to the law.

This might include things like:

talking to the police

going to court

talking to a lawyer.

Sometimes, the people working in the law dont know how to work well with people with disability.

And sometimes people have negative attitudes.

We want to summarise the research about:

How we can help people who work in the law understand how to work with people with disability.

How we can support people with disability when they are trying to access the law.

Helping young people with disability get jobs

Things can be hard for young people with disability when they finish school.

It can be really challenging to get a job.

We want to summarise the research about:

How disability service providers can help at this important time in a persons life.

The kinds of support that work well.

People working together, including:

schools

service providers

young people

their families.

Encouraging employers to offer jobs to people with disability

A lot of people with disability struggle to get and keep good jobs.

We want to summarise the research about:

The things that stop employers from hiring people with disability.

The things that employers need to know about hiring people with disability.

Supporting carers

Everyone knows what a great job carers do.

As the disability sector changes, the role of carers will be just as important as ever.

We want to summarise the research about:

What we can learn from carers.

How we can support carers.

The difference between unpaid care and paid care.

Encouraging people to be active citizens

Being an active citizen means taking part in our society.

It means that:

people have a say about what matters to them

they have more choice and control.

Person Centred Active Support is a new way of supporting people with intellectual disability.

It makes sure that people:

are included in their community

have a say about their lives.

Some work has been done in this area, but we want to know more about:

The evidence showing how active citizenship can make a difference in peoples lives.

How we can know what works.

Any problems that exist about this way of thinking.

What we can do to fix those problems.

Making sure that services meet peoples cultural needs

In Australia, people have many different cultural backgrounds.

People speak a range of languages.

There are many religious and cultural traditions.

This includes Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.

We want to summarise the research about:

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people with disability.

People with disability from a range of cultural backgrounds.

Making sure that services suit peoples cultural needs.

Connecting people in rural and remote areas

Many people with disability live in rural and remote areas.

We want to make sure that people in these areas can get the support they need.

Sometimes, there arent enough support workers.

We want to summarise the research about:

Attracting more support workers to country areas.

Ways for service providers to work together to employ more support workers in the country.

How technology can help.

Helping people speak up for themselves

People with disability can make a real difference when they can speak up for themselves.

This is often called self-advocacy.

Sometimes, this is hard to do perhaps because of communication barriers, or other problems stopping someone from having a say.

We want to summarise the research about:

The best ways to help people speak up for themselves.

How people can make a difference in their community.

How self-advocacy can change attitudes or create awareness about disability.

Being prepared for natural disasters

Did you know that, compared to the rest of the population, people with disability are twice as likely to die or be injured in a natural disaster?

We want to summarise the research about:

How communities are including people with disability when they are planning for disasters.

Better ways our emergency services can help people with disability.

Leading healthy lives

Many people with disability are not as healthy as they could be.

We want to summarise the research about:

The things that can be done to help people with disability to:

exercise more

have a healthy diet.

How to help people with disability learn more about exercise and healthy food.

How to support people