Welfare Reform on the Web (July 2009): Services for the disabled - overseas

Consumer-directed personal assistance and 'care': perspectives of workers and ventilator users

B.E. Gibson and others

Disability and Society, vol. 24, 2009, p. 317-330

'Consumer-directed personal assistance' has been a central tenet of the North American independent living movement since its inception. This is, however, little research on how consumer-directed assistance gets played out in practice. This paper presents the results of a qualitative study that examined the relationship between disabled ventilator users and their paid personal support workers in supported housing in Ontario, Canada. It explores how participants described and evaluated their relationships in relation to the independent living philosophy and consumer-directed personal assistance.