Experiences, attitudes, and knowledge of medical students regarding intellectual and developmental disability: a Canadian study.

Background: As the healthcare of individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD) shifts toward community-based services, physicians in all areas of medicine are more likely to care for this population. To ensure that all physicians can provide high-quality care to people with IDD, further understanding and attention to undergraduate medical education related to IDD is needed.

Methods: A 24-item survey assessed the experiences, attitudes, knowledge, skills, and future interest of Canadian medical students regarding IDD.

Non-instrumental information seeking is resistant to acute stress.

Previous research has shown that people intrinsically value non-instrumental information, which cannot be used to change the outcome of events, but only provides an early resolution of uncertainty. This is true even for information about rather inconsequential events, such as the outcomes of small lotteries. Here we investigated whether participants' willingness to pay for non-instrumental information about the outcome of simple coin-flip lotteries with guaranteed winnings was modulated by acute stress.

When knowledge hurts: humans are willing to receive pain for obtaining non-instrumental information.

Humans and other animals value information that reduces uncertainty or leads to pleasurable anticipation, even if it cannot be used to gain tangible rewards or change outcomes. In exchange, they are willing to incur significant costs, sacrifice rewards or invest effort. We investigated whether human participants were also willing to endure pain-a highly salient and aversive cost-to obtain such information.

Triggering Weight Management Using Digital Avatars: Prospective Cohort Study.

Background: There is evidence that showing motivated people with a less-than-ideal BMI (>25 kg/m) digital and personalized images of their future selves with reduced body weight will likely trigger them to achieve that new body weight.

Objective: The purpose of this study is to assess whether digital avatars can trigger weight management action and identify some of the measurable factors that distinguish those who may be triggered.

Methods: A prospective cohort study followed participants for 12 weeks through 5 recorded interviews.

A systematic review of intellectual and developmental disability curriculum in international pre-graduate health professional education.

Background: Despite the increasing global population of individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD), this population remains especially vulnerable to health disparities through several factors such as a lack of access to sufficient medical care and poor determinants of health. To add, numerous studies have shown that healthcare professionals are still insufficiently prepared to support this population of patients. This review synthesizes the literature on current pre-graduate IDD training programs across healthcare professions with the goal of informing the creation of evidence-based curricula.