Project Areas

• Home
• Mission
• CAC
• Partners
• Links
• Calendar
• Products
• News
• Staff
• Contact

Health

Florida Office on Disability and Health

A collaboration with researchers at the University of Florida (Dr. Elena Andresen, Principal Investigator) has resulted in a $1.6 million grant from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to establish a Florida Office on Disability and Health. FCIC will direct a healthcare parity project with the goal of increasing the capacity of health care providers in Florida to provide quality healthcare to persons with disabilities. Under the direction of the Department of Child and Family Studies’ and Florida Center for Inclusive Communities UCEDD’s Susan Havercamp, Ph.D., the project will provide disability training to medical students and continuing education training to medical and allied health professionals across the state.

Dr. Havercamp’s project is entitled “Towards Healthcare Parity for Floridians with Disabilities: Teaching Core Competence in Disability to Healthcare Providers.” This project will teach core competence in disability to professionals and paraprofessionals in Florida to build the capacity of health care providers to respond to the health care needs of individuals with disabilities. We will work with faculty members in the department of medicine at University of South Florida to enhance their clinical curriculum to provide disability training to 600 students enrolled in the 3rd year of medical school and to measure the growth in knowledge, aptitude, comfort and attitude in providing treatment to individuals with disabilities. In addition, we will disseminate the field-tested core competence in disability curriculum and implementation guide to other interested programs for integration into their clinical training. We also propose to work with the Florida Area Health Education Center Network to provide continuing education training on disability to 500 health care providers over the five years of this project. These training initiatives will expose students to disability issues and build core competence in intellectual, sensory, and physical disabilities.

The overall goal of this project is to increase the capacity of health care providers in Florida to provide quality healthcare to persons with disabilities. Towards this goal, we propose to establish and evaluate a core competence in disability by providing disability training to medical students and continuing education training to medical and allied health professionals across the state.

Four specific elements are critical to core competence in disability:

1. Knowledge of disability: common disabling conditions, disability-specific health issues, and living with a disability;
2. Aptitude: patient-centered care, respectful communication, accommodations needed to meet the healthcare needs of individuals with disabilities;
3. Attitude: attitude towards individuals with disabilities
4. Comfort: student ease and comfort interacting with and serving persons with disabilities Contact Susan M. Havercamp, Ph.D. for more information.

For more information: Florida Office on Disability and Health http://fodh.phhp.ufl.edu/.  The Surgeon General’s Call to Action to Improve the Health and Wellness of Persons with Disabilities.  The Department of Health and Human Services Office on Disability : http://www.hhs.gov/od/

Training Healthcare Providers

The Florida Center for Inclusive Communities Partners with the University of Florida and the USF College of Medicine to Train Future Healthcare Providers. Read the entire story here.

Sexuality & Developmental Disabilities Across the Lifespan

The subject of sexuality can be daunting. Add to the mix a physical or cognitive disability and you may find yourself feeling totally unprepared to deal with the subject matter.

Staff from the Florida Center for Inclusive Communities has collaborated with the Florida Developmental Disabilities Council and University of Albany, Center of Intellectual Disabilities to create an easy to use workbook for families and educators of individuals with developmental disabilities.

We are all sexual beings from the day we are born. Sexuality is the exploration of ourselves - our physical bodies, our emotions, our self-worth and image, and our interrelations with others. It is one of the most basic human instincts, and no matter what level our learning abilities, it is a natural part of being human to have the desire to discover what our bodies are all about.

This Instructional Manual and the accompanying Resource Guides are designed to help educators and family members assist individuals with developmental disabilities in their exploration of self and sexuality.

Click here for the Educator Sexuality Workbook in English
Click here for the Educator Sexuality Workbook in Spanish
Click here for the Parent Sexuality Workbook in English
Click here for the Parent Sexuality Workbook in Spanish