Adults with ID, in general, have a high risk of developing obesity, and women with ID have a high risk of developing morbid obesity. Health promotion initiatives should target individuals with the greatest risk.
Attitudinal and psychosocial outcomes of a fitness and health education program for adults with Down syndrome were examined. Participants were 53 adults with Down syndrome ages 30 years and older (29 females, 24 males, M age = 39.72 years) who were randomized into a training (n = 32) or control group (n = 21). The training group participated in a 12-week, 3 days per week, exercise and health education program. Outcome measures included attitudes towards exercise (cognitive-emotional barriers, outcomes expectations, and performance self-efficacy) and psychosocial well-being (community integration, depression, and life satisfaction). Compared to controls, the training group showed significant changes in attitudes towards exercise, including increased exercise self-efficacy, more positive expected outcomes, fewer cognitive-emotional barriers, improved life satisfaction, and marginally lower depression.
The purpose of this study was to examine the prevalence of falls and risk factors for falls in 1,515 adults (≥ 18 years) with intellectual disability using baseline data from the Longitudinal Health and Intellectual Disability Study. Nearly 25% of adults from the study were reported to have had one or more falls in the past 12 months. The prevalence of falls increased with advancing age. A series of univariate and multivariate logistic regressions were performed to identify risk factors for falls in the full sample and in subsamples. The risk factors for falls in adults with intellectual disability are being female, having arthritis, having a seizure disorder, taking more than 4 medications, using walking aids, and having difficulty lifting/carrying greater than 10 lb.
Secondary conditions are considered a direct consequence of having a disability, and many are presumed to be preventable. Although a few researchers have noted that people with disabilities are exposed to several secondary conditions, including pain, fatigue, depression, and obesity, what is lacking in the literature is a conceptual framework for understanding the antecedents, risk factors, and consequences of secondary conditions. To move the rehabilitation and public health professions toward a more unified approach to understanding and managing secondary conditions as well as distinguishing them from chronic and associated conditions, this article proposes a set of criteria for defining secondary conditions and a conceptual model that considers the potential factors associated with their onset, impact, severity, and management.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.