Development of Co-designed Digital Exemplars to Enhance Health Profession Readiness for Safe and Effective Care of People with Disability

What is Disability-Focused Health Profession Readiness?

Disability‑Focused Health Profession Readiness refers to how well health professionals (such as doctors, nurses, and allied health practitioners) are prepared by the time of graduation/entering the workforce to provide safe, respectful, accessible, and effective health care to people with disability.

It is about ensuring that the health workforce has the knowledge, skills, attitudes, and systems needed to meet the needs of people with disability — who often face barriers to care.

Key concepts explained…

Disability

A disability is any long‑term physical, cognitive, sensory, or psychosocial condition that impacts a person’s daily life. Disability is shaped both by a person’s body/health condition and the barriers in the environment (e.g., inaccessible buildings, poor communication, stigma).

Health Profession Readiness

This means how prepared, based on the skills and training they have received during their coursework, health workers/professionals (as above) are to:

  • Understand disability
  • Communicate effectively
  • Provide equitable care
  • Use accessible practices
  • Work in partnership with people with disability and carers

Readiness includes skills, knowledge, attitudes, and clinical environments, which they have learned about and/or had exposure to during their training.

Disability‑Inclusive Practice

Disability‑inclusive practice means providing care that respects autonomy and dignity, adapts to individual needs, removes physical, communication, or systemic barriers, and involves people with disability in decision‑making about their care.

Person‑Centred Care

This means treating each person as an expert in their own life — understanding their goals, preferences, and lived experience – supporting them to make decisions about their care needs.

Why is Disability-Focused Health Profession Readiness a priority?

Our Faculty’s health students are entering a workforce where disability is common due to ageing populations, chronic disease, and improved survival rates. Disability‑Focused Health Profession Readiness is a priority because health professionals will increasingly work with people with disabilities across all settings, and ensuring they have the skills, confidence, and attitudes to deliver equitable, respectful, and accessible care is essential for safe, contemporary practice.

Students need explicit preparation to:

  • communicate effectively
  • adapt assessments and treatment
  • work respectfully with people with disability and their carers
  • understand rights‑based, person‑centred care

Without this preparation, graduates feel underconfident and risk perpetuating inequities. Embedding disability readiness strengthens curriculum relevance, aligns with accreditation standards, and ensures students develop essential graduate capabilities. Further, staff who are developing and delivering health-related curricula need support to prepare students.

Higher education organisations/institutions, including Monash University, play a critical role in preparing a workforce that can reduce health inequities, meet national disability strategies and rights commitments, and deliver safe, accessible health care across diverse settings. Disability readiness is now seen as a core professional capability, not an optional add‑on. Monash University will develop a disability‑ready workforce that supports equity, diversity and inclusion goals, and further enables meaningful partnerships with disability communities and services.

What is the purpose of this fellowship?

The overarching purpose of this fellowship has been to enhance the quality of the Faculty’s health-related curricula to ensure graduates are sufficiently and appropriately prepared to work safely and effectively with people with disability, including people with intellectual disability. Further, to strengthen existing and seek new interdisciplinary collaborations throughout the process.

Specific goals for the fellowship included:

  • Exploring knowledge and attitudes about disability from Faculty staff who develop and deliver disability curriculum across the Faculty courses
  • Mapping existing disability curricula across Faculty courses using a modified e-Delphi method with Faculty Course Directors
  • Co-design and develop disability-focused resources and/or exemplars with health educators for use in Faculty health profession courses to prepare graduates to work safely and effectively with people with disability.

What were the fellowship outcomes?

This fellowship is currently in-progress and the main outcomes are underway. Our team aim to have outputs available (e.g. resources and/or publications) in late 2026.

How does the work from this fellowship inform future practice?

Following implementation of the research outputs, the team propose rerunning the survey exploring knowledge and attitudes with Faculty staff who develop and deliver disability curriculum and to measure educators' capacity and expertise to integrate co-designed disability-focused resources within their health profession course curriculum. This post-survey aims to identify any changes in attitudes and perspectives across disciplines (e.g. change to confidence, understanding, communication, and own attitudes) to working with people with disability. This may include any changes to the frequency of content delivery and the activities undertaken across the Faculty.

References

Australian Government: Department of Social Services. Australia’s Disability Strategy 2021- 2031. https://www.dss.gov.au/disability-and-australias-disability-strategy-2021-2031, accessed 14 June 2024.

Australian Institute of Health and Welfare [AIHW]. People with disability in Australia 2024, catalogue number DIS 72, (2024). AIHW, Australian Government.

Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. United Nations. 2006.

Royal Commission into Violence, Abuse, Neglect and Exploitation of People with Disability (2023), Final Report – Volume 6, Enabling autonomy and access, accessed 14 June 2024.

World Health Organization Regional Office for the Western Pacific. Disability-inclusive health services toolkit: a resource for health facilities in the Western Pacific Region. Manila, Philippines. (2020). Licence: CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 IGO.