Pre- and Post-COVID-19 Outcomes for Israelis With Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities in the Community.
COVID-19 left Israeli adults with IDD less happy and less skilled, so re-assess and raise support now.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Gur et al. (2023) tracked the same Israeli adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities before and after COVID-19.
Staff or family answered questions about life satisfaction, daily skills, and relationships.
The group lived in the community, not in institutions.
What they found
Most scores dropped. People felt less happy, showed fewer daily living skills, and felt less close to family and friends.
One bright spot: they felt closer to paid staff than before.
Overall, the pandemic hurt quality of life more than it helped.
How this fits with other research
Bolbocean et al. (2022) looked at Israeli families of young children with syndromic autism and saw no drop in family quality of life. The kids’ parents stayed resilient.
The two studies seem opposite, but they looked at different age groups. Ayelet studied adults; Corneliu studied young children. Parents may fight harder to shield little kids, while adult day programs vanished.
Marcone et al. (2023) in Italy also found parents of children with ID/ASD felt more stress and lost services. That matches Ayelet’s drop in adaptive skills, showing the pattern crosses countries.
Why it matters
Your adult clients may still be coasting on lower support levels. Re-check their adaptive goals, social contacts, and mood. Add brief check-ins about happiness and staff rapport. Boost community outings or virtual social groups to rebuild the skills and relationships that faded.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
This study is among the first pre-post examinations to explore differences in subjective well-being, adaptive and maladaptive behavior, close relationships, community integration, family members' satisfaction with residential and community living settings, and family contact before and after the COVID-19 outbreak. Participants demonstrated better life satisfaction and adaptive behavior before COVID-19 than after COVID-19. Participants reported closer relationships with family members and peers before COVID-19 and closer relationships with staff members after COVID-19. The findings reveal mixed, although mostly negative, effects of the pandemic on people with intellectual and developmental disabilities in the community in Israel, in accord with extant comparative research.
Intellectual and developmental disabilities, 2023 · doi:10.1352/1934-9556-61.6.454