The Analysis of the Context of Digital Access to Healthcare in Russia

Digital accessibility is one of the key principles of modern healthcare. The Internet has become a main tool to both communicate and engage patients. This study aims to analyze adults' preferences on health information resources and the utilization of digital healthcare tools in Russia. The data were collected from the online survey conducted in August-September 2020. The association of factors with individual preferences was analyzed using Pearson's χ2 with Holm–Bonferroni correction. The sample included 1319 respondents' submissions. The most prioritized activity on the Internet among all the respondents was social media 64.1% (95% CI 61.4–66.6%). Females, those who are more educated, and more active Internet users were more likely to use all available sources to gather health information. Almost one-half of the respondents (48.0%;95% CI 45.3–50.7%) reported that they did not use any digital tools to manage their medical appointments. Smartphones were more likely to be used by younger and more active Internet users, while personal computers were prioritized as the preferable device to access the Internet by males and older adults. The study revealed that both public health authorities and health providers must provide a wider range of information and digital interaction experiences appropriate to the needs and preferences of patients.

La educación post-Covid y el alumnado con discapacidad o con necesidades específicas de apoyo educativo: marco normativo y experiencias

El objetivo de esta investigación es presentar un análisis de las reflexiones, valoraciones y peticiones del profesorado, alumnado y personal de gestión universitario en relación a la docencia para alumnado con necesidades específicas de aprendizaje, en un marco legal explícito de obligaciones y compromisos adquiridos. El estudio se enmarca en la experiencia de la docencia online o híbrida durante la pandemia de la COVID-19 y se comparan las declaraciones de las personas implicadas con las medidas publicadas por las universidades y las buenas prácticas existentes. Las cuestiones a las que se pretende dar respuesta son: ¿Qué medidas son importantes para el estudiantado con necesidades específicas en situaciones como la vivida? ¿Cuáles lo son para el profesorado? ¿Cómo podemos prepararnos ante nuevas situaciones de emergencia? La metodología de investigación ha consistido en una revisión documental del marco normativo y legislativo aplicable, así como en el análisis temático con base en las transcripciones de 45 entrevistas semi-estructuradas realizadas a estudiantes (27), docentes (10), y personal con responsabilidades relacionadas con el estudiantado con necesidades específicas del aprendizaje (8). Las cuestiones más problemáticas detectadas tanto por estudiantes como por docentes y personal de gestión son la no accesibilidad total de las clases en línea, las aulas virtuales, los materiales docentes, así como de los exámenes o pruebas de evaluación. Por parte del estudiantado, se destaca también el escaso acompañamiento emocional/social con el que han contado.Alternate : The aim of this research is to summarise thoughts, feelings and demands of lecturers, students and support staff in relation to special needs education, within the context of a legal framework with stated compromises and legal duties. The research is contextualized in the COVID-19 pandemics online or hybrid teaching, and it compares the statements of stakeholders with the recommendations issued by universities during this period and with existing best practices. The article aims to give an answer to the following questions: Which are the most important measures for students with special needs in this situation? Which are the most important for lecturers? How can we get ready for similar emergency situations? The methodology consisted in a review of the legal and standard framework, and a thematic analysis of 45 semi-structured interviews to students (27), lecturers (10), and support staff (8). The most problematic areas for students,lecturers and support staff are the inaccessibility of online teaching, virtual classrooms, teaching material, exams and assessment exercises. Students also emphasize the need for emotional/social support and the lack of it.

Students with Disabilities and Digital Accessibility in Higher Education under COVID-19

The COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted education system worldwide. The emergency remote teaching has affected higher education institutions and created challenges for multiple stakeholders including students, faculties, administrators, and policy makers. In this context, the challenges faced by students with disabilities (SWDs) worsened by COVID-19. This paper considers and reflects on existing research on experiences of students with disabilities under the COVID-19 pandemic and identifies challenges and opportunities for supporting students with disabilities and implementing digital accessibility in higher education in post-pandemic world. © 2021 29th International Conference on Computers in Education Conference, ICCE 2021 - Proceedings. All rights reserved

Post-Covid education and students with disabilities or with specific educational support needs: normative framework and experiences

The aim of this research is to summarise thoughts, feelings and demands of lecturers, students and support staff in relation to special needs education, within the context of a legal framework with stated compromises and legal duties. The research is contextualized in the COVID-19 pandemics online or hybrid teaching, and it compares the statements of stakeholders with the recommendations issued by universities during this period and with existing best practices. The article aims to give an answer to the following questions: Which are the most important measures for students with special needs in this situation? Which are the most important for lecturers? How can we get ready for similar emergency situations? The methodology consisted in a review of the legal and standard framework, and a thematic analysis of 45 semi-structured interviews to students (27), lecturers (10), and support staff (8). The most problematic areas for students,lecturers and support staff are the inaccessibility of online teaching, virtual classrooms, teaching material, exams and assessment exercises. Students also emphasize the need for emotional/social support and the lack of it. © 2021 University of Barcelona. All Rights Reserved.

Social Health among German Nursing Home Residents with Dementia during the COVID-19 Pandemic, and the Role of Technology to Promote Social Participation.

The COVID-19 pandemic severely impacted the social health of nursing home residents with dementia due to social isolation. Consequently, the frequency of Behavioral and Psychological Symptoms in Dementia (BPSD) might increase. Technological solutions might help safeguard the social health of nursing home residents with dementia. This study investigates the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on clinical outcomes and the availability of social activities and technology to promote social participation in nursing home residents with dementia. The study analyzed cross-sectional data from a follow-up questionnaire nested in a larger national survey of care facilities in Germany. A mixed-methods approach integrated statistical analyses of closed-ended responses and thematic analysis of free-text responses. A total of 417 valid individual responses were received, showing an overall increase in observed BPSD-with anxiety and depression most frequently occurring. Many nursing homes canceled all social activities for residents with dementia, though a few had established procedures to facilitate social participation using technology. Requirements to promote social participation in this population using technology were identified at the micro-, meso-, and macro levels. Technology requirements permeated all three levels. During and beyond the COVID-19 pandemic, technology-driven solutions to promote social health among nursing home residents with dementia should be integrated into caregiving procedures.

Digital Adaptation of the Portuguese Museums Educational Service in a Pandemic Context—Case Study

The promotion and dissemination of cultural heritage, exhibited in Portuguese national museums, are of great importance, mainly in its educational aspect, but also as a foundation for the perpetuation of memory, both for the population in general and, above all, for children, adolescents and young adults. In this article, the main objective is to investigate the digital adaptation, resulting from the technological innovation implemented in six Portuguese national museums, namely in their educational services, as a way to overcome the problems created by the COVID-19 pandemic, problems that were aggravated during periods of lockdown and closure of these museums. We also intend to analyse the problem of accessibility to digital information and to understand how the institutional web contents of these educational services of the museums under study, which depend on the Direção Geral do Património Cultural (Directorate General for Cultural Heritage), comply with the accessibility requirements contained in Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.0 (WCAG 2.0) of the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), as set out in Directive (EU) 2016/2102 of the European Parliament and the European Standard EN 17161:2019. The final analysis revealed several weaknesses that affect the interest and motivations of users, given the wide range of museum product offerings. © 2022, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd.

User-Adapted Web Services by Extending the eIDAS Specification with Functional Attributes.

To provide web services adapted to the users' functional capabilities, diversity must be considered from the conceptualization and design phases of the services' development. In previous work, we proposed a model that allows the provisioning of adapted interfaces based on users' identity and their functional attributes to facilitate this task for software designers and developers. However, these identities and attributes are self-declared by the users, which may impact reliability and usability. In this work, we propose an extension of our model to resolve these deficiencies by delegating the identity and attributes' provision to external certified entities. The European electronic Identification, Authentication and Trust Services (eIDAS) regulation established a solution to ensure the cross-border mutual recognition of Electronic Identification (eID) mechanisms among the European Member States. This research aims to provide an extension of this regulation mentioned above (eIDAS) to support functional attributes and connect our previously proposed model to this extended eIDAS network. Thanks to this proposal, web services can guarantee adapted and personalized interfaces while improving the functionalities offered without any previous configuration by users and, in a reliable way, since the functional attributes belong to the users' official eID. As the attribute set provided by eIDAS nodes only contains citizens' personal and legal ones, we also propose a mechanism to connect the eIDAS network to external attribute providers that could extend the eIDAS profile of users with their functional attributes. We deployed a pilot to validate the proposed model consisting of an identity provider, an eIDAS node supporting the extended reference code, and an attribute provider supporting functional attributes. We also designed and implemented a simple service that supports eID authentication and serves adapted interfaces based on the retrieved extended eIDAS profile. Finally, we developed an experience for getting feedback from a set of real users with different functional capabilities. According to the results, we concluded that the generalized adoption of the proposed solution in the European digital web services will significantly improve their accessibility in terms of ease of use and adaptability to users' capacities.