Health understanding and behavior among people with intellectual disabilities: a qualitative study

BackgroundStudies on health understanding and health behavior rarely consider people with intellectual disabilities. The study generates new findings on health understanding and health behavior of people with intellectual disability in the setting of sheltered workshops for people with disabilities (WfbM).ObjectiveAssessment of subjective health estimations and health understanding of people with cognitive impairment including conceptions about potential conditional factors for health as well as health and risk behavior.Material and methodsIn total, 18 qualitative interviews have been conducted in simple language with disabled workers in sheltered workshops for people with disabilities and have been analyzed by using qualitative content analysis.ResultsThe majority of the target group have adifferentiated understanding of health, which is reflected in their health behavior. There are also some statements indicating an insufficient knowledge about health. The results highlight adiscrepancy between knowledge about ahealthy life style and the self-reported actual behavior.ConclusionThe study results provide implications for the conception of measures geared for the target group in institutions for people with disabilities. Furthermore, attention has to be paid to the comparability of the simple language review group and the actual interviewees as the knowledge of health behavior and the reported own behavior differed among both groups. In addition, ahigher degree of participation of the target group in the research process should be pursued.