Question

Write an analysis based on people who have intellectual disabilities health care case studies, situations, issues, and/or research to demonstrate critical thinking for effectively solving the provlem Conduct professional research and write a literature review to analyze findings. Also, identify data collection method on intellectual disabilities.

Answer 1

Good health significantly improves a person's quality of life. However, people with intellectual disabilities disproportionately have more health problems than the general population. Further complicating the matter is that people with more severe disabilities often cannot verbalize health complications they are experiencing, which leads to health problems being undiagnosed and untreated. It is plausible these conditions can interact with reinforcement contingencies to maintain problem behavior because of the increased incidence of health problems among people with intellectual disabilities.

Health problems are illnesses, injuries, impairments, or physical conditions negatively affecting a person's quality of life. In general, health problems among people with intellectual disabilities (ID) are similar to those in the general population, although certain health conditions are more prevalent among the ID population. Some of the more common health conditions among people with ID include motor deficits, epilepsy, allergies, otitis media, gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD), dysmenorrhea, sleep disturbances, seizure disorders, mental illness, vision and hearing impairments, oral health problems, and constipation. Further complicating the issue is that the more severe the disability, the less likely health problems are to be diagnosed and treated. Undiagnosed and/or untreated health problems may reduce a person's life expectancy and contribute to the development of secondary health complications. It is becoming increasingly clear that, in some cases, comprehensive assessments and treatments are necessary to attenuate the influence of health problems on rates of problem behavior. However, behavior analysts are not trained to diagnose and treat health problems, and health professionals do not have the expertise in applied behavior analysis to identify response-reinforcer relations.

Therefore, comprehensive assessments should be a collaborative effort between these professionals. They describe how comprehensive functional assessments can identify interactions between common health problems and reinforcement contingencies influencing problem behavior in persons with ID. However, it also seems possible that some mental illnesses may change the value of particular reinforcers. For example, a depressive phase of bipolar disorder may be associated with an unwillingness to participate in educational activities, establishing escape from the activities as negative reinforcement. Similarly, a manic episode of bipolar disorder may be associated with increased risk-taking behaviors, establishing certain events as more positively reinforcing than usual (e.g., promiscuity, excessive spending, drug taking). More research is needed to isolate symptoms of mental illness associated with problem behavior in people with ID. However, some studies have reported that treatment of conventional psychiatric symptoms improves associated problem behaviors.