Working after Brain Injury Final Version 1.0
Research type
Research Study
Full title
FRESH - Facilitating Return to work through Early Specialist Health-based interventions
IRAS ID
136037
Contact name
Kathryn Radford
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
University of Nottingham
Research summary
Traumatic brain injury (TBI) can affect the ability to work, with long term detrimental effects on the person, their family and the economy. Rehabilitation to help TBI people return to work is variable and non-existent in some parts of the UK. Vocational rehabilitation (VR) involves finding ways to ‘match’ the TBI person’s abilities and limitations to the demands of their job and work environment. The person, job and workplace are assessed and employers educated about TBI, legal responsibilities and necessary workplace changes. It involves using rehabilitation strategies e.g. improving stamina and compensating for problems e.g. memory aids and negotiating a phased return. Sometimes re-training and negotiating work placements are needed for those unable to resume previous jobs.
In our previous study we compared work outcomes of people with access to Early Specialist TBI VR support (ESTVR) to people without and found those who received ESTVR returned to work sooner and remained in work 12 months later. The extra NHS cost was only £75 per person. But this was a small study and we don’t know whether the outcomes were due to ESTVR or chance.
Because no national model for VR exists we propose a feasibility study to determine whether ESTVR can be delivered in 3 new centres.
We will develop a manual (based on previous study), train therapists in 3 UK centres to deliver ESTVR, then recruit 102 people with TBI (all severities) and randomly select 51 each to receive ESTVR or usual NHS rehabilitation. We will follow them up at 3, 6, and 12 months after injury using postal questionnaires and explore additional ways of boosting data capture e.g. texting. We will then interview TBI participants and employers about the usefulness of ESTVR; therapists about the training and other NHS staff about the impact of ESTVR on NHS services.REC name
East Midlands - Leicester South Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
13/EM/0353
Date of REC Opinion
21 Oct 2013
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion