Partnerships in Care: Attributes of successful care coordination models which improve health care networks for people with intellectual disability.

Abstract

People with intellectual disability in rural areas experience a 'double disadvantage' in relation to the healthcare they receive, due to both their disability and geographic location. This research project sought: to discover: how rural people with intellectual disability establish and maintain their care networks; to identify models of care coordination that have supported health care for this group, and to develop and test a short term intervention of two localised models of care coordination in rural communities. The project was designed to identify key attributes of care coordination and understand how, and in what circumstances they function to provoke a systemic change that will lead to the outcomes of holistic and universal care for rural people with intellectual disability.