Dr Karen Horridge Hello, I’m Dr Karen Horridge.  I’m a recently retired Paediatrician who’s spent   my whole clinical career working with disabled  children and young people and their families. I’m   now a Visiting Professor at Childhood Disability  and Development at the University of Sunderland. So, I’m going to be talking today about what we  mean by ‘disability’. It means different things to   different people. I think it’s always important  for us to understand the definition behind   any terms that we use. So when I use the term  ‘disability’, I’m referring to the World Health   Organization’s Conceptual Framework of Disability,  which is based on the International Classification   of Functioning, Disability and Health. Otherwise  known, in a more friendly way, as the ICF. So you may be familiar with older models of  disability. There was the ‘medical’ model,   where everything was thought to be due to  disease that could be fixed with interventions   and medicines. And then, there’s others that  promoted the ‘social’ model of disability,   which believes that everything is  down to environmental factors that   can be ameliorated in order to  reduce the level of disability. So what the ICF model of disability does  is actually brings these two together in   a ‘bio-psycho-social’ model of disability.  So in this conceptual framework there are   various elements that interact with each other,  and together, determine how disabled anybody   is at any point in time. So a disability is  essentially something that can affect any of us,   to a greater or lesser extent,  at different times in our lives. So the component parts are the health  condition itself, there’s then the   body structure and function, and how that  condition affects that. But then, importantly,   there are the activities that the person wants  to do and their participation, which means not   just being present, but interacting with that  activity. There are then personal factors,   which make some of us more vulnerable or more  resilient, and those important environmental   factors. And environmental factors are not just  about whether there’s a ramp and how wide the   doors are, but also things like policies and  practices in organisations. People’s attitudes,   how welcoming and inclusive they are to  people who are different or disabled. So I like the way of expressing the ICF framework  that’s promoted by my friend and colleague,   Professor Peter Rosenbaum, in Canada, and  he talks about the ‘f’ words of disability.   So, instead of thinking about body structure  and functions, activities participation,   personal factors and environmental factors,  he talk – and his group talk about fitness,   family, fun, friendship and the future  and functioning. So, those ‘f’ words   are a good way of remembering a  holistic approach to disability. I think it’s really important for us to  have some sort of framework to consider,   which embraces not just physical health needs  of a person, their mental health needs, how they   interact with their environment, what they want  to do in their life, and how they see the future. So, I hope you’ll be inspired to a read a little   bit more about the ICF framework and  the ‘f’ words in disability, and to   take that approach when you consider the needs  of the children and young people that you see. Thank you for listening.