Engender are undertaking research on “Disabled Women: Our Bodies, Our Rights”. Disabled women and girls have the same rights as non-disabled women and girls but these rights are often not realised. We want to find out what needs to change to make the experiences of disabled women in Scotland better, so we’re working with disabled women to learn more about their experiences of reproductive and parenting services (everything from sexual health to parenting to the menopause). We will be sharing our findings with decision makers in healthcare, education and social work, as well as policy-makers, disabled people’s organisations, disabled women and their families. There isn’t a lot of research on this out there so we’re looking to fill that gap.
As part of this, we ran two consultation events last winter, and we are currently in the process of organizing some smaller focus groups to be held around Scotland in June to further explore the subject. We are also sending out a survey which disabled women can fill out and return to us.
Our survey is here and we would be super grateful if you shared it in your networks and encouraged disabled women to fill it out – it’s anonymous and confidential, and written in an easy read format: https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/HKJ2R8N