Hopefulness and Perception of Barriers Among Job Seeking Veterans with SCI Prior to Initiation of Vocational Rehabilitation Interventions

Research Objectives: To report baseline data on perceived hopefulness and barriers among job seeking Veterans with Spinal Cord Injury (SCI) as measured by the Employment Hope Scale (EHS) and Perceived Barriers Scale (PEBS) a baseline prior beginning vocational interventions as part of the ACCESS-Vets study. 1

Design: 4-year, 2-site randomized clinical trial to test the efficacy of customized employment compared to supported employment.

Setting: 4-year, 2-site randomized clinical trial to test the efficacy of customized employment compared to supported employment.

Participants: 35 currently enrolled Veterans (of an target sample of 50) with SCI ages 18-65, who desire employment and live near the VAMC completed a baseline survey prior to random assignment to treatment arms.

Interventions: The Individual Placement and Support model of Supported employment will serve the treatment as usual arm. Customized employment a promising vocational intervention being adapted for use in SCI healthcare will be the intervention arm.

Main Outcome Measures: 1. Employment Hope Scale2 collapsed into domains of psychological Empowerment, futuristic self-motivation, utilization of skills and resources, and goal-orientation. 2. The Perceived Barrier Scale3.

Results: Each domain was averaged on a 0 to 10 scale with 10 being the highest levels of hopefulness. Participants reported on average at baseline 8.86 (SD 1.46) in terms of Psychological Empowerment, 7.47 (SD 2.28) in terms of Futuristic self-motivation, 7.60 (SD 2.57) in terms of utilization of skills and resources, and 6.51 (SD 2.13) in terms of goal-orientation. Commonly reported barriers to employment were reported physical disabilities (60.0%) and work limitations due to injury of illness (51.4%). Additionally, lack of information about jobs (31.4%), lack of adequate job skills (25.7%), and a shortage of jobs in the community (25.7%) were reported by over a quarter of all participants.

Conclusions: This preliminary examination suggests this baseline sample of Veterans with SCI reported above average levels on most domains of hopefulness when entering vocational rehabilitation among this baseline sample. Barriers reported are consistent with the literature 4. Upon study completion, an analysis of the follow up data with the full sample will shed light on how hope and perceptions of barriers may be associated with different vocational interventions and their employment outcomes.

Author(s) Disclosures: The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.
Funding and disclaimer: VA Office of Research and Development, VA Rehabilitation Research and Development (RR&D) Grant #D3349R. Contents of this poster do not represent the views of the Department of Veterans Affairs or the United States Government.
Clinical trial registration number NCT04832802