Improving the Daily Life of People who are Ageing with Disabilities

Abstract

focus is often on diagnosis with relatively little attention paid to aspects of ageing. For instance, in research on Parkinson’s disease old age is often used as an exclusion criterion. Overall, the tangible benefits from preclinical work are insufficient, and clinical studies have a limited influence on the daily life experience of people living and ageing with neurodegenerative diseases. Evaluations of clinical therapies and interventions seldom mirror the needs and expectations of the affected individuals and their families and researchers have not sufficiently involved them in identifying and prioritizing research issues. Occupational therapy research has the potential to address such issues, but to succeed we must develop innovative avenues for fruitful interdisciplinary collaboration. Much occupational therapy research remains monodisciplinary and its readership is similarly limited to occupational therapists and related health professionals. However, in bringing both practical and professional experience and a growing body of theory to gerontology, occupational therapy is today actively contributing conceptual input and methodological expertise as well as new empirical knowledge within the field (Wahl and Iwarsson 2007). How to tackle the gaps in knowledge outlined in this editorial? Some suggestions include the necessity to invest in new research collaborations, address novel questions, and offer theoretical and methodological expertise hitherto unknown in research on ageing and relevant fields. Occupational therapists need to publish in journals outside the profession, just as other disciplines are encouraged to publish in occupational therapy journals. Through merging different research traditions and perspectives we gain the potential to break new ground in improving the daily life of people ageing with disabilities.