ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the multidisciplinary in that it combines media and health communication research. It focuses on the ethical implications of the portrayal of disabilities in the media. The chapter examines the ethics of disability representation on primetime television by focusing not only on the representation of health in the media but also the accuracy of such portrayals. The discussion of media ethics does not frequently extend into examining fictional television programming content. The World Health Organization uses "disability" as an umbrella term to describe impairments, activity limitations, and participation restrictions. Disability refers to the negative aspects of the interaction between individuals with a health condition and personal and environmental factors. Health practitioners can encourage media producers to utilize organizations such as the Media Access Office (MAO) in Los Angeles, which was founded in 1980 to help producers provide more realistic and responsible representations of people with disabilities.
