We know that loneliness can lead to poor health. We also know that people with disability are more likely to feel lonely than people without disability. What we don’t know is how loneliness affects the health of people with disability aged 15-64. This article summarises the current research on this topic.

To do this, the researchers first looked for other studies interested in the same thing. They wanted to find studies that looked at loneliness and health for disabled people. They followed a particular set of rules to gather information. Researchers call this process a ‘scoping review’.  

The authors wanted to look at how other researchers measured health and wellbeing because there are lots of ways to do this. Some of the ways to measure mental health were anxiety, worth, and happiness. Having a chronic illness was one of the ways to measure physical health. Being unable to do normal activities due to fatigue was also a measure of physical health. The researchers found that the tools to measure loneliness were not the most appropriate. This is because they were intended for non-disabled people.

There were very few articles looking at the effect of loneliness on the health and wellbeing of disabled people. This makes it very hard for us to fully understand the topic. Also, the existing research is very particular to one context. For example, it was all done in wealthy countries. This makes it hard to generalise the findings to people with disability.

This article gives us an overview of existing research about loneliness and health outcomes for people with disability. It found there was not much research on the topic. If we want to find ways to reduce loneliness for disabled people, more research is needed. Otherwise, strategies to reduce loneliness might not be effective for people with disability.

About the author:

Rosie (she/they) is a lived experience research assistant living with mental illness. She loves the challenge of pursuing her interests in literature and health sciences concurrently and is proudly the only poet-physiotherapist that she knows of.