People with disabilities face barriers and hardships more frequently then non-disabled people. The World Health Organization (WHO) describes barriers as “Factors in a person’s environment that, through their absence or presence, limit functioning and create disability. These include aspects such as:

  • a physical environment that is not accessible,
  • lack of relevant assistive technology (assistive, adaptive, and rehabilitative devices),
  • negative attitudes of people towards disability,
  • services, systems and policies that are either nonexistent or that hinder the involvement of all people with a health condition in all areas of life.”

Barriers can be categorized under six headings including attitudinal, communication, physical, policy, social, and transportation.

Attitudinal barriers

Attitudinal barriers may include stereotypes, prejudice, discrimination, and stigma related to having a disability.

Communication Barriers

Communication barriers include ineffective communication methods such as inaccessible auditory or visual messages that prevent people with disabilities from being included or preventing participation.

Physical barriers

Physical barriers prevent mobility or access to the community such as stairs leading into a building, no automatic door, or a community space that cannot accommodate a wheelchair.

Policy Barriers

Policy barriers include lack of laws that enforce accessibility for persons with disabilities. Policy barriers may include denying persons with disabilities from accessing programs, services, or benefits.

Social Barriers

Social barriers are related to the social determinants of health including employment rates, education completion rates, income, and family violence.

Transportation barriers

Transportation barriers include a lack of adequate transportation available that restricts a person’s ability to access their community.

Types of Disabilities

Physical Disability

A physical disability includes any impairment that limits an individual’s mobility including spina bifida, heart defects, epilepsy, multiple sclerosis, Tourette’s syndrome, paralysis, cerebral palsy, and muscular dystrophy. Physical disabilities can affect partial or full functioning of an individual’s limbs or body.

Visual Impairment

Visual impairment includes vision loss resulting from disease, trauma, congenital, or degenerative conditions. Common types of visual impairments include loss of peripheral vision, blurred vision, light sensitivity, and night blindness. Visual impairments also include partially sighted, low vision, legally blind, or totally blind individuals.

Hearing Impairment

Hearing impaired individuals have difficulties perceiving different sound frequencies, and includes conductive hearing loss, sensorineural hearing loss, auditory neuropathy spectrum disorder, among many others.

Intellectual Disability

Intellectual disabilities refer to a broad range of disorders that can affect an individual’s ability to comprehend and process information. Intellectual disabilities include those with developmental delays, Prader-Willi syndrome, and down syndrome.

Mental Health and Emotional Disabilities

A mental illness, or psychological disorder, imposes subjective distress that may reflect in an individual’s behavior such as anxiety, suicidal ideation, or depression. Other mental health and emotional disorders include mood disorders, impulse control and addictions, personality disorders, and post-traumatic stress disorder.

Developmental Disability

Developmental disabilities include intellectual and developmental disorders, autism, speech and language disorders, sensory-related disabilities, and degenerative disorders.

Invisible and Hidden Disabilities

Invisible disabilities refer to disabilities that are not easily recognized such as Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder, learning disabilities, epilepsy, diabetes, attention deficit disorder, cystic fibrosis, chronic pain, dyslexia, and crohn’s disease.