How We Can Improve Digital Health Technology for Older Adults: Inclusive Processes and Measuring Meaningful Outcomes

Social Technologies

Author: Dr Richard Vance, Post-Doctoral Researcher, Department of Psychology and Assisting Living & Learning (ALL) Institute, Maynooth University

Dr Richard Vance
Dr Richard Vance

“I fear the day when technology overlaps our humanity” goes a quote, which is dubiously attributed to Albert Einstein on the internet—sometimes you can trust technology, sometimes you can’t.

Last week was Social Justice Week in Maynooth, and it’s as good a time as any to reflect on whether we’re making a positive difference to the lives of others and the world around us. I want to look at how we’re approaching the design and provision of digital health technologies for older adults to promote health and well-being and reduce inequality.

Continue reading “How We Can Improve Digital Health Technology for Older Adults: Inclusive Processes and Measuring Meaningful Outcomes”

Maynooth University’s Social Justice Week: Reflections on the Intersections between the DANCING project and the SDGs

Social Lives

Author: Léa Urzel, PhD Researcher ERC Project DANCING, Assisting Living and Learning (ALL) Institute, Department of Law, Maynooth University

DANCING Logo

The Social Justice Week is currently taking place at Maynooth University. Thanks to the collaboration of staff, students and other agencies, an array of events has been organised to promote social justice and human rights. This year’s edition is dedicated to the United Nations (UN) Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Adopted in 2015, the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development established ‘an action plan for people, planet and prosperity’ and introduced 17 SDGs to guide decisions of a wide range of stakeholders at State, regional and global level. Under this UN initiative, world leaders have committed to taking joint action to achieve the SDGs and the 169 associated targets over the next 15 years. Integrated and indivisible, the SDGs and its related targets address global challenges ranging from poverty, health, education, gender equality to clean water, sanitation, or climate action.

Continue reading “Maynooth University’s Social Justice Week: Reflections on the Intersections between the DANCING project and the SDGs”

Judicial Review of Assessment of Need

Social Structures

Author: Mac MacLachlan, Co-Director of the Assisting Living and Learning (ALL) Institute, Professor of Psychology & Social Inclusion, Maynooth University and Clinical Lead for Disability Services, Irish Health Service (HSE)

Professor Mac MacLachlan Profile Picture
Mac MacLachlan

On the 11th March 2022, Justice Siobhan Phelan’s Judicial Review , was released which sought to address the grievances in two particular cases, and to interpret the intensions of the Disability Act (2005) regarding the Assessment of Need (AoN) process. I can make no comment on the particular cases, but I would rather comment on the broader issues touched upon in the decision and on Justice Phelan’s interpretation of the AoN process, while well intentioned and carefully considered, seems to me very problematic. While she refers to a related 2019 report from the ALL Institute on a closely related topic, the judgement will not help us address the challenges, which are certainly not unique to the Irish context.

The Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) for the AoN was introduced to have a standardised and shorter assessment time, allowing for services that assist children and parents to be provided more quickly.  It allowed for assessment continuing as part of routine clinical practice alongside services such as therapy, recognising that assessment is not a one-off event, and that people’s needs change over time.  The SOP also allowed for the situation where, should a preliminary assessment not be sufficient to identify the need for services, then a more detailed assessment would follow. This is a pragmatic approach, to maximise the impact of available resources, as the Health Service Executive (HSE) is compelled to do under section 7 of the Health Act (2004): resources should be used in the “most beneficial, effective and efficient manner”. 

Continue reading “Judicial Review of Assessment of Need”

Learning as a Lifelong Process

Social Lives

Author: Dr. Katja Seidel, Senior Post-Doc Researcher in SHAPES (Horizon 2020); Department of Anthropology and Assisting Living & Learning (ALL) Institute at Maynooth University

Katja Seidel
Katja Seidel

We all learn. Every day we live we experience something new, acquire novel skills or engage with a new person or activity for the first time. Learning thus never ends, not even when we leave formal educational pathways or retire. The Horizon 2020 Innovation Action research project SHAPES (Smart and Healthy Ageing through People Engaging in Supportive Systems) led by Maynooth University and ALL Institute members, starts from the assumption that people of all ages are capable of learning and integrating new tools and behaviours into their lives, especially when assisted in an appropriate manner. This four-year research project looks at ways in which integrated care and governance models as well as smart technologies can support community dwelling older adults to live healthy and active lives, and investigates different pathways for change and innovation that will have a beneficial impact on our societies in Europe.

Continue reading “Learning as a Lifelong Process”

Never-ending One Day War

Stories/Lived Experiences

Author: Iryna Tekuchova, PhD Researcher, Department of Law, Maynooth University.

Iryna Tekuchova

February 24th, I woke at 7am in rainy Ireland. It had to be a busy day: reading, researching, editing. I made myself a cup of coffee and turned off the “airplane mode” on my phone. Five missed calls from my mother, seven – from my sister, and twenty-five unread messages from my friends popped up on my screen. I did not even need to read them to understand what it was about.

Russia attacked Ukraine. The war has begun.

I will never use the “airplane mode” on my phone again.

Continue reading “Never-ending One Day War”

Gender-based Violence and Disabled Women: Let’s Talk

Social Lives

Author: Eliona Gjecaj is an early-stage researcher in the DARE project (Disability Advocacy Research Europe) based at the University of Iceland. Her PhD research focuses on ‘Violence against Disabled Women: Access to Justice’ in Iceland and the UK.

Eliona Gjecaj
Eliona Gjecaj

Today, on International Women’s Day, I would like to celebrate all the survivors of gender-based violence, especially disabled women, and encourage others to come forward and tell someone. Gender-based violence is not and should not be taboo. Much like the saying ‘talk the talk, walk the walk’, we must have the experience talk. We must access the justice walk.

Let’s first  highlight that there are so many unheard experiences of gender-based violence of disabled women that we need to hear, to believe, to recognise as breaches of law, and thus, provide support and access to reporting and prosecuting such violence. Lack of disability-rights-based knowledge, awareness, and training should not be the defence, but rather acknowledged and addressed. Not just in Ireland, but in many countries across Europe.

Continue reading “Gender-based Violence and Disabled Women: Let’s Talk”

The impact of Covid-19 on women in academia: A step backwards for gender equality?

Social Lives

Author: Dr Rebecca Maguire, Department of Psychology, Maynooth University

Rebecca Maguire
Rebecca Maguire

International Women’s Day is a great time to celebrate the numerous achievements of women across the world. However, it is also an important time to reflect on the struggles and inequalities that persist for many. Unfortunately, despite significant strides towards gender* equality in recent years, as a group, women remain disadvantaged in the world of work relative to their male counterparts. This includes the oft-cited gender pay gap – the difference in median earnings between men and women – that persists in many sectors. Academia is no exception to this, with a recent report from the HEA showing that, in 2020, men made up 73% of Professors in Ireland, compared to women who made up just 27%. This is despite the fact that women make up a greater proportion of early career researchers and lecturers in academia – an effect often referred to as the “leaky pipeline”.

Continue reading “The impact of Covid-19 on women in academia: A step backwards for gender equality?”

Open Science – what is it and can we teach it?

Social Lives

Author: Dr Nicola Mountford, Assistant Professor, School of Business, Maynooth University

Nicola Mountford
Nicola Mountford

Opening Doors is a collaborative, interdisciplinary, intersectoral and international learning experience for early career researchers in Open Science and Open Innovation – applicable to all academic disciplines.  As the project to develop and pilot this learning experience draws to a close, I reflect on my own learning experience as one of the principal investigators within the consortium.

Opening Doors, is an EU-funded co-ordination action aimed to research and develop a learning experience and networking opportunity for early career researchers using open, online resources. Specifically, our proposal said that we would focus on open science and open innovation. The first time our consortium met – Maynooth University (MU), Aarhus University (Denmark), the National Training Fund (Czech Republic), and UCD (Lead) – we spent a surprising amount of time discussing what open science and open innovation meant to the various partners. Coming from the School of Business, I had a good sense of what was meant by open innovation – as Chesbrough put it, “a more distributed, more participatory, more decentralized approach to innovation”. When it came to defining open science, however, I struggled. Following the definition of open innovation, open science presumably indicated a more distributed, more participatory, more decentralized approach to science. But, when we speak of open innovation, we tend to see industry-based innovators reaching into academia and across the general public. Open science seemed to require that we academics return the favour.

Continue reading “Open Science – what is it and can we teach it?”

The Tragic Age: Life without a PA

Stories/Lived Experiences

Author: Ross Coleman is a Translator, Writer and Disability Rights Activist from Dublin

Ross Coleman Profile Picture
Ross Coleman

“Ours is essentially a tragic age, so we refuse to take it tragically”, thus opens D.H Lawrence’s famous novel Lady Chatterley’s Lover, published in 1928 in which a bored unfulfilled housewife embarks on an affair with the gardener on her husband’s estate. Clifford Chatterley, Lawrence informs us, is a cripple, badly injured from serving in the front. Since his injury, he has become cold and unfeeling, absorbed in books and his intellect, only going outside to toot along in his electric bathchair. When I first read the book a few years ago, I dismissed it as a bygone relic of an ableist age. And yet, despite that, I was forced to admit a single harrowing fact: nothing has really changed.

I require a Personal Assistant (hereafter referred to as a PA) in order to help with daily tasks that I cannot do myself: getting dressed, going to the bathroom, showering. At the moment, my parents provide this support and have been providing it since I was born.  If I want to go out, I either have to go out with my parents or just not go to the bathroom. Neither of these are desirable solutions. I should not expect, neither do I want, my parents to accompany me to every social function, but nor can I just not go to the bathroom.

Continue reading “The Tragic Age: Life without a PA”

The future of work and disability: learning our way forward

Social Lives

Author: Joan O’Donnell, Doctoral researcher with the Assisting Living and Learning (ALL) Institute, funded by ADVANCE CRT and the SFI. She lectures in the MSc programme in Systems Thinking In Practice with the Open University and is the author of the Employers for Change report referred to in this blog.

Joan O Donnell Profile Picture
Joan O Donnell

Continuous advances in technology and Assistive Technology (AT) enhance the range of work that people can do outside the office environment, making working-from-home (WFH), hybrid or remote working a realistic option for many workers with disabilities.  It may suit those seeking greater flexibility in their working day, allow for better management of disabling conditions at home or sidestep the need to negotiate public transport.

Disability and work poses a complex issue that persists despite broad recognition of the interrelationship between disability, poverty, education, housing in the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) Article 27, which commits to safeguarding and promoting the right for disabled people to work on par with others. While  the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) suggests there is a greater need to engage employers to build a better world of work for persons with disabilities, the ESRI finds that  there is also a need to understand the experience of disabled people in work.

Continue reading “The future of work and disability: learning our way forward”
Skip to content