Be Aware and Prepare for Disasters Like Earthquakes

by Rosemarie Punzalan, Training Specialist

Earthquakes can happen at home, at work, at school, or even on vacation.  It is important that you, your loved ones, your pets, your co-workers and millions of others are prepared for any kind of disaster that could take place - especially an earthquake.

Last Thursday, October 18, 2012 at 10:18 AM PST millions of people participated the 2012 Great California Shakeout's Drop, Cover, and Hold On Drill . The purpose of the drill is to practice how to protect yourself during an earthquake.  Below is a Demonstration of Drop, Cover, and Hold On video by the Los Angeles County Firefighters.

Below are some more handy resources:

• The Great California Shake Out http://www.shakeout.org/california/
• Drop, Cover, and Hold On! http://www.shakeout.org/california/dropcoverholdon/
• Drill Manuals and Other Planning Documents
• ShakeOut Drill Manual for K-12 Schools (299 KB PDF)
• ShakeOut Drill Manual for Businesses (733 KB PDF)
• ShakeOut Drill Manual for Non Profits and Other Organizations (303 KB PDF)
• ShakeOut Drill Manual for Government Agencies and Facilities (258 KB PDF)
• ShakeOut Drill Manual for Hospitals (PDF)  

Is your office/home prepared for a disaster like an earthquake? Share these resources with your loved ones, co-workers, schools, and offices and develop your own disaster preparedness plans.

The Scooter That Saved My L(W)ife

By Allan M. Friedman, CFILC's Technologies Manager

A wheelchair wasn't going to cut it.  It just wasn't going to work in our house. 

My wife sustained a severe injury to her right foot last summer.  She recently had surgery to repair it.  But the healing process takes a long time and she must be off her feet for most of it.  So we needed to find a way for her to get around in our house; our circa 1979, two-story, fully carpeted house. Unless, of course, she stayed in bed the entire time.  If you knew my wife you'd know that is out of the question.

She couldn't use crutches. We tried a walker but it proved to be too difficult as well.  She's not very strong.

Kaiser, in their usual one-size-fits-all way, would only provide a standard hospital wheelchair which doesn't work in our home.  Pushing a standard wheelchair on carpets is extremely difficult and besides, our interior doors are thirty inches wide and our hallway is forty-two inches wide.  The wheelchair is also thirty inches wide. Have you ever tried making a hard right turn in a confined space like that?

Fortunately, I was able to borrow a scooter from the California Assistive Technology Reuse Coalition (CATRC).  This scooter has been our savior.  Now my wife can move around the house quite easily. It gets into every room (on the ground floor). And with a couple of homemade ramps (plywood and two x fours) she was able to get over the two inch step to our front door and the four inch step at our back door.  This scooter allowed her to continue working right up to her surgery last month.

photo: http://kidsonroll.com/MobilityScooters/

Thanks to the scooter her frustration over the limitations of her injury are over.  She is so happy to be able to do things and go places. The only negative aspect is loading it into the car.  It's heavy!  I was glad when she stopped working so I didn't have to lift the scooter in and out of the car so much.

When she got home after the surgery we faced a new dilemma.  The scooter was a great solution while she had a cast on her foot and could sit normally, but now she has to keep her foot elevated.  We thought we'd try a wheelchair again but with her leg extended it was impossible to get into the bedrooms and bathroom.  The scooter solved that problem too.  A laundry basket on its base lets her keep her leg up and still navigate the house.

It will be many months before my wife is able to stand or walk.  We both work for non-profits and don't have the resources to buy something like this new. Thanks to CATRC we have been able to use this scooter to help her through this.  And I don't have to do laundry anymore!

photo: http://www.rootandscoot.com/index.html

Do you have an AT success story that you would like to share? Please use the comment box to let us know about your AT adventures.

Disability History Week 2012

By Kirk Aranda, CFILC’s Youth Organizing! Disabled and Proud Youth Advocate


It’s that time of the year again!   

It’s time to celebrate Disability History Week! This is a very exciting time where youth from all over California go to their local schools to present lesson plans on disability history topics to teachers and students.   

In 2009, a group of YO! (Youth Organizing!) Disabled and Proud members came together and decided that they wanted to make the teaching of disability history in all schools throughout California a priority.  The Disability History Week Campaign was established as a statewide youth-driven effort to educate students and teachers with and without disabilities about the significant contributions to civil rights made by people with disabilities. This campaign was successful and, in 2010, a resolution was passed by the California State Legislature designating the second week of October officially as Disability History Week.

Now every year in October, YO! volunteers and members go into schools  to present and educate students and teachers on disability history.  Each lesson plan includes various historical facts that are not yet generally taught in school’s history curriculum. How many Californians know about Ed Roberts or the Independent Living Movement?  How many know of Justin Dart's integral role in getting the Americans with Disabilities Act passed? Many Californians aren't even aware that their own state played a large role in the disability rights movement - or about the accomplished work  of Judy Heumann, among many others. Judy helped to organize massive sit-ins at the U.S. Department of Health Education, and Welfare offices in San Francisco and around the U.S. which ultimately resulted in the signing into effect the Rehabilitation Act's Section 504 regulations. 504 states that it is illegal for federal agencies, public universities and other public institutions receiving  federal funds to discriminate on the basis of disability. This protest lasted for twenty-five days and remains the longest occupation of a federal office in U.S. History.

Disability rights activists Judy Heumann and Kitty Cone in Washington, D.C. for a series of meetings and rallies – which ultimately resulted in HEW Secretary Joseph Califano signing the Rehabilitation Act’s Section 504 regulations.

Ed Roberts - A pioneering leader and disability rights activist

There are many important facts and ideas about disabilities and disability history that are not often addressed by teachers - often because they haven't been taught disability history themselves. This topic is important to everyone because, not only is knowledge empowering, unifying and the first step in creating awareness and respect for one another, but also because people with disabilities have been marginalized, ignored, and/or hidden from society for centuries.  There have been many great achievements made by leaders with disabilities that are important for people with and without disabilities to recognize. Teaching disability history in schools is the first step towards rectifying a past filled with discrimination and prejudice. Like all social justice movements, disability history needs to be taught alongside other civil rights movements. And now, thanks to YO! members and other youth leaders, anyone can have access a variety of age-specific disability history lesson plans that include PowerPoint presentations and interactive learning games such as a disability history Jeopardy game.

Justin Dart - Activist and advocate for people with disabilities. He helped to pass the Americans with Disabilities Act in 1990 

Disability History Week brings much passion and excitement to everyone involved; more and more schools throughout California and the rest of the U.S. are participating and our goal now is to keep up this momentum.  Let's work together to ensure that this important week expands to all schools so that communities everywhere know about their important civil rights history.

Were you taught about disability history at your school? Please share your experiences with either teaching or learning about Disability History Week. 

Sleep Apnea and the Continuous Positive Air Pressure (CPAP) Machine

Written by Kevin Hansen, CFILC's Information and Data Specialist

Have you ever slept for eight to ten hours during the night and then woke up feeling exhausted the next morning, as if you had not slept at all? Have you ever felt an overwhelming urge to take a nap after being awake for only a couple of hours because the eight to ten hours of sleep didn’t feel like enough?

This is the way that I felt each morning after what I considered a deep sleep. In fact I would take two naps a day for two hours a each day for three days a week and I was still tired.

During an annual physical, I told my doctor about my sleeping problems. After discussing other options we decided that I should be tested for sleep apnea. The first test was taking oxygen monitoring system home and attaching the sensor to my index finger as I slept that night. I received the instructions that every time I woke up I should write down the time that I awoke on a piece of paper. After the fourth wake up I finally realized that I was waking up a lot at night but never realized it. 

Twenty percent of  U.S. males suffer from sleep apnea, even though many don’t even realize it. That is approximately 18 million people that either know - or don’t know - that they suffer from obstructive sleep apnea. Every year, almost 4% of men and 2% of women over 35 years of age are identified as obstructive sleep apnea sufferers. A shocking 90% of all cases are thought to go unrecognized, due to the fact that the symptoms are not easily picked up on by the sufferers themselves, and most do not know that there is treatment available to remedy the sleep apnea.

photo courtesy of http://sleepapneadisorder.info

photo courtesy of http://sleepdisorders.dolyan.com/

After this night of restless sleep I took the oxygen monitor back to my doctor where they read the results and gathered more information. I was then referred to a sleep clinic for a sleep study. This was essentially like being in a hospital bedroom that had microphones and an infrared video camera in the room to monitor sleeping habits. They hooked me up to multiple sensors that would also help monitor my heart rate, brain waves and oxygen. During the night they woke me up and asked me to put on an air mask that was hooked up to a CPAP (Continuous Positive Air Pressure) machine. I slept the rest of the night with this mask on my face and the CPAP machine running.

 

photo courtesy of http://www.drpaulo

The next morning I awoke and went home - and took another nap!  A couple of days later my doctor called me in to go over the results. He told me that I stopped breathing 7 to 10 times a night and my blood oxygen level went down to 81%. He said that he was prescribing a CPAP machine for me to use every night. When I heard this I realized that I actually was waking up multiple times every night. I still had thought it was just that I was uncomfortable and needed to find a new sleeping position in my bed or a new bed or pillow. However, this was not the case. The reality was that I  had stopped breathing and was gasping for air. This personal  revelation was very scary!

The doctor explained to me, that, at night when I sleep my throat closes shut and does not allow air to move freely. He told me to  imagine taking a straw and placing one end of the straw on my finger and sucking on the other end of it. The straw looses it shapes and becomes flat and no air can pass through it. This is what was happening to me every night I thought I was going to sleep. The CPAP machine helps you re-inflate the collapsed straw -or throat-  and thus keeps your blood oxygen levels higher.

It took me a couple of weeks to get used to sleeping with the CPAP machine. I have now slept with this machine for over thirteen years and I cannot imagine sleeping without it. I wake up feeling refreshed after 7 to 9 hours of sleep every night and no longer need to take two hour daily naps.

The CPAP machine is one of the best things that has happened to me – I am grateful for this life-saving AT device every night.

photo courtesy of http://dormiamattress.wordpress.com