Do Not Resuscitate Orders

Disabled People’s Perspectives

The aim of this small-scale user controlled project is to explore with other disabled people their views, ideas and experience of Do Not Resuscitate (DNR) orders. It will be an initial exploratory project to begin to identify, in a systematic way, disabled people's views and the key issues as they report them. This is an issue gaining increasing public attention but where, as far as we know after some consultation with disabled people's organisations, no specific work has been done to find out what disabled people themselves think, although disabled people are one of the specific groups affected by such orders. The project will seek to place a broad interpretation upon disabled people to include mental health service users/survivors, people with learning difficulties, older and younger disabled people, and people living with HIV/AIDS etc. The work will be based at The Centre for Citizen Participation, Brunel University.

The research worker is Fran Branfield, and the project will also involve Peter Beresford. The aim of the project is to bring together some focus groups of disabled people and some individual interviews, according to participant's preferences, to discuss what they see as central issues. It is not expected that only disabled people who have directly been affected by DNR orders will be included in the project since the aim is to find out 1) the impact that such orders have generally on disabled people's lives and 2) the way such orders may have affected people. It is hoped that in this project initial feedback from disabled people about their views on DNR order's and broader issues, such as proposals for euthanasia etc as well as possible strategies for the future will be discussed.

If you have any information about existing work in this field from the perspective of disabled people, if you would like to know more about the project, if you would be interested as a disabled person, broadly defined, in taking part in the project please contact Fran Branfield: 01608 659 366; franbran@zoom.co.uk or Peter Beresford, Centre for Citizen Participation, Brunel University, Twickenham Campus, 300 St. Margaret’s Road, Twickenham, Middlesex, TW1 1PT.

© Copyright British Council of Disabled People 2002