Evidence-Based Care for Developmental Disabilities
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Evidence-Based Care for Developmental Disabilities
Countries focus on evidence-based care, using such concept to ration services and funds to healthcare institutions. Governments cut many funds on a yearly basis from services provided for developmentally disabled individuals and within health care because of the belief that most of the services provided are not needed (Cronin & Kelly, 2011). This approach exists all over even as people believe that the concept is simply a cover up for rationing since it sounds bad in real life. With the advances in healthcare reforms, it is evident that evidence-based care considerably interconnected is widespread and is not seemingly going away any sooner.
New York State can improve in terms of residential care facility offering long-term services to people with disability and chronic conditions. According to Houser, Kassner Reinhard (2011), the responsible people seek to shift focus from institutional based care and nursing homes, to include a broader range of care options. Laws that offer administration options for funding to create a care system that meets the demands of the local needs enhance such moves. There is need therefore to develop systems that help in measuring the progress of the services towards meeting the needs of the disabled (Houser, Kassner Reinhard, 2011).
2.2 Needs of Persons with Developmental Disabilities
People with developmental disabilities are commonly diagnosed with Cerebral Palsy, autistic, bipolar, behavioral, severe long-term problems, learning disorders and Down syndrome. As Bergstrom, Marttila & Wahlstrom, (2014), explained, people with disability need sound care with positive attitude with respect both directly or indirectly with communication that meet their needs and according to their level of understanding. One must be able to communicate in a way that can be understood by them and express things in a way that they would comprehend. They also need to modify health care that is not rigidly based on general knowledge of a person but on information about health implications of such disability (Bergstrom, Marttila & Wahlstrom, 2014). Even as much as acute conditions take leading priority of the people with disabilities, they need health promotion and disease prevention as they suffer all the same effects as the rest. The residential care system should incorporate all the necessary care functions that may be required. Assessment to determine each time the needs of the people with disability in every community can be conducted in line with the budgetary allocations to avoid deficits.
Shannon and Tappan (2011) considered specialized education vital for persons with disabilities just as education, among other rights is subjected to everyone without exception. The parents’ perceptions and that of other society members must be enlightened so that they realize the persons with disability equally require services as the rest. Many people lack understanding about the developmental disabilities. Thus, even the care service provided in their localities may not benefit them. The service providers must thus develop avenues of monitoring and evaluating children within their areas to identify any abnormality in their development (Shannon and Tappan, 2011). Improved screening boosts the identification of developmental abnormalities in children and therefore capacity of the residential care facilities need to enable assessment of the situations with a proper referral link for any allegations that cannot be verified at their levels.
2.3 How diagnosis help save cost for IDD services
Criteria for the conditions appropriate for screening children for developmental disability must be set in a manner reducing mortality and benefiting a child (Paschos and Sheehan, 2013). It is necessary that newborns be subjected to compulsory regular medical assessments through their development in childhood to detect any anomaly earlier. The diagnosis directly benefits the child from as early as at birth and through the childhood development stages. The service providers monitor the development of a child and measure what is to be achieved at each stage.
Paschos and Sheehan (2013) argue that in case of any delay in development detected, the practitioner must further establish if the delay is reasonable or abnormal and recommend further care; either corrective or that will keep the child from further complications. The practitioners also necessarily obtain some information on the history of the child from the parents on the development of the child. The primary care provider also engages with the child in structured activities to assess the attention of the child and the social-emotional relatedness for earlier intervention. Earlier diagnosis of disabilities helps in advancing care and minimizes costs of expenditure on extreme treatment events (Pashas and Sheehan, 2013).