Many of the clients we see have suffered a traumatic brain injury. What makes these cases so interesting is the complexity of the injury and how much the symptoms vary from person to person. Although it can be argued that any injury can have a spectrum of symptoms and effects on return-to-work, it is especially true in TBI cases. Brainline.org puts this in perspective in their article, TBI Research Review: Return to Work After Traumatic Brain Injury. Here are some take-home points:

“Whiteneck and colleagues, analyzing data from the Colorado TBI registry, which includes all people hospitalized with TBI in that state, found that about 50 percent of those who were severely injured failed to RTW at one-year post injury.”

“In short, while existing research tells us general characteristics of people who are less likely to return to productivity, the research does not tell us whether any specific person with TBI will succeed or fail.”

“The body of research shows that our knowledge is clearly inadequate regarding our effectiveness in attempting to help people with TBI in RTW. We also have no clear idea of just what the problem is in successfully promoting RTW. Thus, to define and evaluate potential solutions to the problem of RTW, we first need to better define the problems that interfere with post-TBI RTW.”