Barriers and facilitators to obtaining accessible housing among children, youth and young adults with disabilities and their families: a scoping review

Abstract

Purpose

Accessible housing is a fundamental human right and yet many children and youth with disabilities live in inaccessible, insecure, unaffordable and poor quality housing. The aim of our study was to understand the barriers and facilitators to obtaining accessible housing among children, youth and young adults with disabilities and their families.

Methods

We conducted a scoping review involving seven international literature databases from 2000 to 2022 that identified 38 studies meeting our inclusion criteria.

Results

The reviewed studies involved 10 countries over a 22-year period. Our review emphasized the following key trends: (1) barriers to obtaining accessible homes (i.e. common types of accessibility barriers, rates of inaccessible housing, factors affecting home accessibility), and negative impacts of inaccessible housing; and (2) rates and facilitators to obtaining accessible housing (i.e., common types of home modifications, enablers of home modifications) and positive impacts of accessible housing.

Conclusions

Our findings highlight the barriers and enablers of obtaining accessible housing among children, youth and young adults with disabilities and their families and the critical need to support them in securing appropriate housing.

Implications for rehabilitation

• Evidence suggests that clinicians and community service providers should support youth with disabilities and their parents to make home modifications and secure accessible housing.

• Clinicians should consider advocating for accessible housing and help to remove barriers for children with disabilities and their families with particular attention to marginalized and equity-deserving groups.

• Clinicians and service providers should involve families in the process of making accessible home modifications and help them to connect with relevant housing stakeholders.

Keywords:

• Ableism
• accessibility
• children
• equity
• housing
• social inclusion

Acknowledgments

We wish to acknowledge this land on which the University of Toronto operates. For thousands of years it has been the traditional land of the Huron-Wendat, the Seneca, and the Mississaugas of the Credit. Today, this place is still the home to many Indigenous people from across Turtle Island and we are grateful to have the opportunity to work on this land. The authors thank the TRAIL lab staff for their support in this project.

Authors’ contributions

Conception and design: SL; Article screening: SL, SR; data extraction: SL; Verification: SR, KF, YL. SL drafted the whole manuscript. All authors critically reviewed and commented on the final version.

Disclosure statement

The authors report no conflicts of interest.

Additional information

Funding

Funding for this research was provided, in part, by a SSHRC Knowledge synthesis grant (872-2022-1009) awarded to S. Lindsay