Attitudes of general practitioners towards health care for people with intellectual disability and the factors underlying these attitudes.
GPs will treat illness but dodge prevention for people with intellectual disability, so behavior teams must set up the visit and bring the checklist.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Christian et al. (1997) asked doctors in west Gloucestershire how they feel about caring for people with intellectual disability. They mailed a short survey to every general practice. The survey asked if doctors were happy to do medical care, health checks, and health teaching.
The study wanted to know why some doctors say yes to treatment but no to prevention.
What they found
Almost every doctor agreed that treating illness was their job. Most doctors did not want to run special health-promotion visits or screening clinics for people with intellectual disability.
Doctors said they lacked time, training, and clear payment for these extra tasks.
How this fits with other research
Geckeler et al. (2000) ran the same survey three years later and got the same answer: doctors accept medical care duty but feel under-prepared. This gives a clean replication.
Faso et al. (2016) looked at real GP visits across Australia and found people with intellectual disability receive far fewer preventive services than other patients. This extends the 1997 attitude data with hard numbers.
Smith et al. (1997) surveyed 529 Australian GPs the same year and also blamed poor training and communication. The two 1997 papers from opposite sides of the world match almost word for word.
Why it matters
If you support adults with intellectual disability, do not expect the GP to lead on cancer screens, dental checks, or weight management. Take the next Monday visit to hand the doctor a one-page summary of the client’s red-flag health needs and offer to book a longer double slot. Your brief and polite push can turn the doctor’s ‘no time’ into a clear, billable plan.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
An intellectual disability attitude questionnaire was used to explore the attitudes of general practitioners (GPs) towards primary health care, organizing health promotion and the role of specialist services for people with intellectual disability. The results of this questionnaire from GPs in Gwent (Wales) and GPs in west Gloucestershire (England) were compared. The GPs in both areas responded similarly and tended to agree that they were responsible for the medical care of people with intellectual disability in the community. They also tended to feel that the move from hospitals to the community of people with intellectual disability would greatly increase their workload. The GPs in both areas were generally against a responsibility on their part for health promotion and health screening initiatives for people with intellectual disability. However, GPs in west Gloucestershire felt more strongly against these issues. Further analysis of the data revealed factors which influenced the response of GPs to the questionnaire, including their position regarding health promotion and screening, and their view of the role of specialist health services. The GPs generally felt that community learning disability teams provided useful support, and there is clearly scope for team members to liaise more closely with GP practices and to provide helpful information to GPs about intellectual disability and the specialist health services available. Professionals seeking to work collaboratively with GPs should be sensitive to their workload pressures and to their attitudes towards health promotion initiatives and health screening.
Journal of intellectual disability research : JIDR, 1997 · doi:10.1111/j.1365-2788.1997.tb00726.x