Combating Medical Violence Against Deaf, DeafBlind, Blind and Partially Sighted Communities: A Community-Based Research Agenda for Canada and Abroad.

INTRODUCTION

Globally, disabled individuals experience persistent social inequalities and health inequities, yet the health and wellbeing of Deaf, DeafBlind, blind, and partially sighted (DDBBPS) people remain profoundly under-researched and excluded from social science and health policy agendas. Existing studies narrowly focus on narratives of hearing and vision impairments within a medical model of disability, which pathologizes difference and obscures the biomedical origins of social inequalities and health inequities experienced by these groups.

METHODS

Drawing on critical disability studies and community-based literature, this narrative review introduces and applies the concept of medical violence to examine how systemic ableism, audism, and ocularcentrism shape DDBBPS people's healthcare experiences.

RESULTS

We identify six interrelated manifestations of medical violence: denied interpreting services, inaccessible health communication, harmful interpersonal practices, health inequities and medical avoidance, absence of DDBBPS practitioners, and gaps in community-based care.

CONCLUSIONS

These conditions reinforce a cycle of exclusion and misrepresentation, wherein DDBBPS persons are denied equitable access to healthcare and are simultaneously constructed as objects of cure rather than as knowledge holders. We argue for a community-based participatory research agenda led by and for DDBBPS communities to challenge ableist research paradigms and advance health equity.