A Prospective Study of Factors Influencing Return to Work After Traumatic Spinal Cord Injury in Taiwan
Abstract
Lin M-R, Hwang H-F, Yu W-Y, Chen C-Y. A prospective study of factors influencing return to work after traumatic spinal cord injury in Taiwan.
Objective
To examine comprehensively the effects of physical, psychologic, and sociologic characteristics on employment among persons after a traumatic spinal cord injury (SCI) in Taiwan.
Design
A prospective study with follow-up telephone interviews over a 3-year period.
Setting
To register people who had sustained an SCI, medical records of 4 hospitals were reviewed using codes of the International Classification of Diseases–9th Revision–Clinical Modifications from 806.0 to 806.9 and from 952.0 to 952.9.
Participants
Subjects (N=219) employed at the time of injury.
Interventions
Not applicable.
Main Outcome Measures
Employment status after an SCI.
Results
The employment rate was 32.9%. After controlling for other variables, education level (relative rate [RR]=4.01∼8.17), autonomy in transportation (RR=5.13), professional licensure (RR=1.86), and thrill and adventure-seeking trait (RR=1.12) were positively and significantly associated with employment, while subjects with more severe overall injury severity (RR=0.95), preinjury chronic conditions (RR=0.20), necessity for aids for daily living (RR=0.31), and depression (RR=0.38) were less likely to have been employed than their counterparts.
Conclusions
In addition to education level and traditional physical factors, overall injury severity and psychologic factors such as thrill and adventure seeking and depression can also influence the return to work after an SCI.
aInstitute of Injury Prevention and Control, College of Public Health and Nutrition, Taipei Medical University, Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China
bDepartment of Nursing, National Taipei College of Nursing, Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China
cDepartment of Emergency Medicine, Taipei Medical University Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China
Reprint requests to Mau-Roung Lin, PhD, Institute of Injury Prevention and Control, Taipei Medical University, 250 Wu-Hsing Street, Taipei 110, Taiwan, R.O.C.
This work was funded by the National Health Research Institute (NHRI-EX96-9204PP), Taiwan, Republic of China.
No commercial party having a direct financial interest in the results of the research supporting this article has or will confer a benefit on the authors or on any organization with which the authors are associated.
ABSTRACT