Working with a brain injury: Personal experiences of returning to work following a mild or moderate brain injury

Abstract

Objective: Most brain injuries occur in people of working age. Individuals with mild or moderate injuries may have unrecognized problems affecting return to work. Previous studies have focused on factors that predict return to work after brain injury. There is limited information about the experiences of individuals returning to work. Design: Individual interviews explored the work-related expectations and experiences of workers who had sustained mild to moderate brain injury. A sampling frame ensured a spread of participants by age, injury severity and work type. Methods: Thirty-three interviews were conducted 4-6 months post-injury. Most participants had returned to work. Interviews were transcribed verbatim for thematic analysis. Results: Key emerging issues for participants were the invisibility of their injury, continuing symptoms affecting their ability to do their job and lack of advice and guidance on returning to work. Return to work support systems were considered to be poorly coordinated and managed. Conclusion: It is important that healthcare professionals anticipate the vocational rehabilitation needs of patients who have sustained mild to moderate brain injury. These patients may require additional coordinated interventions and specific person-centred information to ensure a successful and, most importantly, a sustained return to work.

Returning to work after stroke: a review

“…Returning to work for people experiencing neurological challenges may contribute significantly to their life satisfaction, wellbeing, self-worth and social identity, giving an opportunity to maintain independence as far as physically possible with the income generated through employment (Banks and Pearson, 2003;Vestling et al, 2003;Stuart, 2004;Koch et al, 2005;Medin et al, 2006;Gilworth et al, 2008).…”

"We all need employment" - An exploration of the factors which influence the return-to-work after a severe traumatic brain injury

“…Prolonged engagement in the research over one year was used to ensure credibility 33 . The results of this study were related to similar studies [4][5][6][7][8] to determine the validity of the findings. Dependability and confirmability were achieved by utilising an audit trail, code-recode and reflexive journal strategies during data collection and analysis 4 .…”

“…Conklin, Flaumer and Venables 3 regarded vocational rehabilitation as a predictor for return-to-work and sustained employment. Gilworth et al 4 further assert that vocational rehabilitation significantly impacts on the return-to-work process. While individuals with mild and moderate TBI's manage to achieve some degree of successful return-to-work, individuals with severe TBI's experience large scale marginalisation 4 .…”

“…Gilworth et al 4 further assert that vocational rehabilitation significantly impacts on the return-to-work process. While individuals with mild and moderate TBI's manage to achieve some degree of successful return-to-work, individuals with severe TBI's experience large scale marginalisation 4 . Engagement in the worker role is a complex phenomenon which involves dynamic interaction between internal factors such as motivation and external factors such as societal perceptions of people with disabilities.…”

“…Rehabilitation focuses on restoring function in basic and instrumental activities of daily living where vocational rehabilitation is directed towards restoring function related to a work environment 24 . Vocational rehabilitation significantly impacts on the return-to-work process and should therefore be considered part of the primary rehabilitation goal 4 . In South Africa, the National Rehabilitation Policy 25 was developed to provide therapeutic and client-centred rehabilitation to individuals at a Primary Health Care level; but there seems to be some implementation challenges to this policy.…”