October 6, 2023 Columns by Ed Tobias People with disabilities should be part of equity in healthcare You’d think that people with multiple sclerosis (MS) and other disabilities would have easy access to healthcare services. That’s not always so. A small study in the journal Health Affairs that I wrote aboutĀ last year said many physicians āexpressed explicit bias toward people with disabilities and described…
July 7, 2023 Columns by Ed Tobias We need more advertisements portraying people with disabilities I nearly jumped for joy ā well, I would’ve if I could’ve ā when I saw a new TV commercial for the Expedia travel company the other day. It shows a woman in winter who’s obviously had enough of the cold, ice, and snow. She is desperate to…
January 26, 2023 Columns by Benjamin Hofmeister MS Makes Me Feel Like a Child Again, and Not in a Good Way The other day, my middle child opened the door while I was in the bathroom. If you have children, a surprise visit in what should be a sanctuary isn’t unusual, but in this case, what he said was. He observed me aboard my toilet and shower chair, which progressive…
June 2, 2022 News by Vanda Pinto, PhD Pandemic’s Negative Aspects Tied to Worse Disability in MS Patients Worsening disability was associated with worry about COVID-19 in people with multiple sclerosis (MS) living in the U.S. and Italy, a study evaluating the pandemic’s impact has found. In both countries, MS patients with greater psychological disabilities, such as depression, were more likely to have worrying thoughts, while those…
March 22, 2019 Columns by John Connor Singing the Bureaucracy Blues You think getting a chronic illness is as bad as it’s going to get, but then you quickly realize that you’ve been catapulted into a netherworld. There’s no stepping through the back of the wardrobe into Narnia ā I’m pretty sure C. S. Lewis didn’t envisage disabled access furniture!…
February 15, 2019 Columns by John Connor Stuck in Delivery Limbo Land Take a minute … and relax. It’s been a fraught few weeks of numerous solo hospital visits, as my wife was first dealing with a dying fatherĀ and then helping to organize his funeral, estate, and her own turbulent emotions. Her mum had died only four months ago.
February 26, 2018 Columns by Debi Wilson Improvements Needed for Better Accessibility for People with Disabilities So many of us are affected by disabilities, and day-to-day we strive to live our lives the best we can. The struggles due to theseĀ disabilities can consume a lot of our precious and sparse energy. Anything that can be modified in the home, at businesses, or anywhere we choose…
January 23, 2018 News by Patricia Silva, PhD Online Video Aims to Show How ‘Invisible’ Disabilities Affect Lives The Invisible Disabilities Association (IDA) has created a video to raise awareness about the hardships of disabilities that are real but not readily evident to passersby, and often complicate life for people with multiple sclerosis (MS) and other disorders. The video, called āI Am Invisible No More,ā features…
November 12, 2014 News by Patricia Silva, PhD Inability to Recognize and Convey Emotion a Symptom of MS What may be overlooked in relating to and caring for patients with multiple sclerosis is the fact that the neurodegenerative disease sometimes affects a person’s ability to properly convey and perceive emotion. According to the National Multiple Sclerosis Society (NMSS), while there is not…