Check out the new BLOOM

By Louise Kinross

Please read the latest issue of BLOOM! 

Here are some quotes to pique your interest:

From the lead investigator of a report based on 18 studies about disability and pregnancy in Ontario: Women with disabilities ‘were more likely to experience rare but serious physical health complications; more likely to visit the ER or to be hospitalized; more likely to have mental illness or to experience interpersonal violence; and their babies were more likely to be born preterm and small for gestational age.’ (See Health Equity)

From a 40-year veteran clinician and researcher at Holland Bloorview recalling outcomes research in the 1980s: ‘While it seems unbelievable to us now, there was a sense in the research world then that you couldn't take what a child or parent reported as accurate or valid. Ours was one of the first functional status questionnaires to allow a child and family to report on how they did things at home, at school and in the community.’ (See Trailblazer)

From the disabled author of a children’s book who pushes back against the idea that children should be taught to explain their disabilities in public. ‘We believe those advocacy skills can become an obligation to respond to what are often personal and rude interrogations, by breaching one's own privacy. If we wouldn't offer up our most personal history, as parents, to satisfy a stranger's passing curiosity, then why would we encourage our disabled children to do so?’ (See BookShelf)

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