At an Ohio school that serves 150 multiply handicapped children, maintenance staff spread some old insecticide around a storage shed in a misguided attempt to kill rodents. Cleanup efforts cost over $15,000. Advises schools to examine their policies regarding pesticides. Lists information sources and the availability of a booklet on pest control.…

This annotated bibliography lists 170 articles, books, and other professional publications related to blindness, visual impairment, and deaf-blindness. The bibliography's scope does not include medical literature or popular magazines. The entries are arranged alphabetically by author, and an analytical subject index is also supplied. (JDD)

Data from 348 patients (mean age 37) with postacute spinal cord injury revealed that 95% reported at least 1 secondary problem, and 58% reported 3 or more. The number and severity of complications varied with time since the injury. Obesity, pain, spasticity, urinary tract infections, pressure sores, and lack of social integration were common…

Evaluation of a shared-work program found that job coach assistance to three workers with severe multiple disabilities could be reduced by assigning each worker only those job tasks able to be performed with minimal assistance while ensuring that entire tasks were still completed by combining steps performed by all three workers. (Contains…

This study examined the relationship between psychopathology and motivation in 111 participants with mental retardation and psychiatric disorder and 11l participants with mental retardation only. The former scored higher on 8 of the 15 motives and had more motives above one standard deviation from the mean of the normative sample. Results support…

This study estimated the incidence of speech delay based on a demographically representative sub-sample of 1,328 monolingual English-speaking 6-year-old children. Among six major findings were: (1) the prevalence of speech delay was 3.8 percent; (2) speech delay was 1.5 times more prevalent in boys than girls; and (3) comorbidity of speech delay…

This article criticizes the term "comorbidity" used to describe the overlap of developmental syndromes or disorders. Data from 179 school-age children are evaluated for criteria of seven disorders. Since fully 50 percent of the sample met the criteria for at least two diagnoses, the premise that these disorders are discrete categories on…

Four experiments with six students with multiple profound disabilities examined the function of behavioral stereotypies and sensory modalities maintaining them. Findings are discussed in terms of the sensory and social reinforcers that maintain stereotypy, assessment procedures used to identify reinforcers, and the interpretation of assessment…

A functional behavioral assessment was conducted to identify the maintaining function(s) of aberrant behaviors displayed by a 6-year-old diagnosed with multiple disabilities. The assessment included indirect measures such as interviews, rating scales, and direct observations such as antecedent, behavior, consequence (A-B-C) charting. These…

The purpose of this study is to describe some of the ways deaf-blind projects collect National Technical Assistance Consortium for Children and Youth with Deaf-Blindness (NTAC) census data, compare Office of Special Education Programs (OSEP) Child Count and NTAC census data for the ten states included in this study and identify issues and concerns…

This paper addresses the varied and often contradictory emotions that accompany living with multiple disabilities. The author incorporates his personal experiences (e.g., as a middle school teacher, as a doctoral student, and as a researcher) with disability as he attempts to reflect upon his perceptions of the world as a disabled individual. In…

The authors assessed new microswitch clusters (i.e., combinations of two microswitches) and contingent stimulation to increase adaptive responses (i.e., foot and head movements) and reduce aberrant behavior (i.e., finger mouthing) in a boy with multiple disabilities. Initially, intervention was directed at increasing the frequency of each adaptive…

Persons with profound and multiple disabilities (PIMD) are dependent on staff to be sufficiently knowledgeable as to provide them with appropriate day services. One important determinant of the appropriateness and adequacy of a day support program is the level to which staff have detailed and specific knowledge about the functional abilities and…

Assessment of severely multiply handicapped children was completed via formal and informal assessment with data covering medical, ophthalmological, auditory, and educational aspects. Visual functioning was evaluated by considering the type of visual stimulus experienced, varying visual tasks, and student motivation and ability. Auditory evaluation…

The final report documents accomplishments of a project designed to establish a full time continuing education program for severely multiply handicapped young adults. The Over-21 project was further designed to establish a widely replicable, innovative, model educational program as an alternative to the traditional "day care" focus of…