Removing Barriers: The Path towards Inclusive Access - Disability Assessment among Syrian Refugees in Jordan and Lebanon

Concerning the lack of disability data in the Syria crisis context, Humanity & Inclusion (HI) and iMMAP conducted the study aimed at the following:

1. Provide statistically reliable prevalence of disability as well as disability disaggregated data indicators on access to services.
2. Increase understanding of the situation of Syrian refugees with disabilities and their households, compared to their peers without disabilities, in relation to the access to services including education, and key barriers experienced in accessing these services.
3. Recommend inclusive actions to be prioritized by humanitarian actors.
4. Methods

The study conducted a literature review, quantitative data collection as well as qualitative data collection. Quantitative data was collected from 6,381 persons of randomly sampled 1,159 households in Azraq and Zaatari camps and Irbid between October 2017 and January 2018. In the light of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD), the study defined disability as interactions between personal and environmental factors. Disability was measured the level of difficulties a person faces when performing basic activities (referred as “domains”) regardless of impairments, using the modified Washington Group’s Extended Set (WG-ES) (more precisely, Short Set Enhanced plus fatigue) and Child Functioning Module (CFM).Twenty-five Key Informant Interviews (KIIs) and 3 Focus Group Discussions (FGDs) were also conducted between November 2017 and January 2018 to elicit deeper insights on the educational situation of children with and without disabilities.