University research theme/s: Healthy people, families and communities; Social change and equity
Children with developmental disabilities face challenges such as discrimination, being placed in special care facilities, difficulties in accessing healthcare, and poorer health and education outcomes compared to their peers.
In 2017, funded by the National Health and Medical Research Council (NH&MRC) and in-kind support from University of New South Wales, La Trobe University, SWSLHD and Sydney Children’s Hospital Network, Emeritus Professor Cheryl Dissanayake AM collaborated on a paper estimating the prevalence of moderate or high developmental difference on the Parents’ Evaluation of Developmental Status (PEDS) – Prevalence and factors associated with parental concerns about development detected by the Parents’ Evaluation of Developmental Status (PEDS) at 6-month, 12-month and 18-month well-child checks in a birth cohort.
In 2019, Emeritus Professor Cheryl Dissanayake AM was (one of 26) invited as a Commissioner on the Lancet Commission on Autism (2019-21), resulting in a landmark paper – The Lancet Commission on the future of care and clinical research in autism.
In 2023, the World Health Organization and the United Nations Children’s Fund released its Global Report on Children with developmental disabilities: from the Margins to the Mainstream. This report provides principles and approaches to intentionally include the needs and aspirations of children and young people with developmental disabilities in policy, programming and public health monitoring. Our research fellow, Dr Ifrah Abdullahi, contributed to the World Health Organisation-UNICEF report
The report references the Lancet paper multiple times in section 4 of the report – Transforming care systems for Children and young people with developmental disabilities, and the developmental difference paper is used to describe a strengths-based approach on page 5 of the report:
The perspective of neurodiversity can stimulate researchers, clinicians and policy-makers to use practices that fully embrace strengths-based and participatory approaches, address structures of exclusion and promote equality.
United Nations Sustainable Development Goals
