The Role of Healthcare Professionals in Providing Sexuality Education to Young People with Disabilities: A Scoping Review on Barriers and Challenges

AbstractWhile sexuality education is vital in supporting their sexual development, young people with disabilities experience specific barriers to accessing information related to sexuality. There are also indications that young people with disabilities have more unplanned pregnancies and STIs (sexually transmitted infections) and are more often victim of sexual violence. Further, sexuality education is often insufficiently adapted to their disability and/or level of development. In this review, we first investigate whether young people with disabilities are receiving sexuality education from healthcare professionals. Subsequently, we explore the barriers for young people with disabilities to receive sexuality education in healthcare settings and the challenges that healthcare professionals experience in discussing sexuality with young people with disabilities. In order to answer these questions, we conducted a scoping literature review following the PRISMA guidelines. A substantial amount of young people with disabilities never received any form of sexuality education by healthcare professionals, and when they did get information, it often did not meet their expectations. Four main barriers were described for young people with disabilities related to receiving sexuality education from healthcare professionals. From the healthcare professional's perspective, seven challenges were identified. In order to meet those challenges, it is necessary to gain a further picture through a...
Source: Sexuality and Disability - Category: Disability Source Type: research