title: Psychosocial stress, cognitive performance and disability after common whiplash.
abstract: The relationship between psychosocial stress, cognitive performance and disability was assessed in 97 randomly selected common whiplash patients. Patients were investigated early after injury (mean 7.2 days, SD = 3.8) and again at 6 months. Assessment included different aspects of psychosocial stress, negative affectivity, personality traits and attentional functioning. At 6 months six patients (7%) showed partial or complete disability (disabled group) while 91 patients went back to work at pre-injury levels (non-disabled group). However, 26 patients from the latter group at 6 months were still symptomatic. The disabled and non-disabled groups did not differ with respect to psychosocial stress, negative affectivity and personality traits as assessed at baseline. At 6 months no significant differences were found between the disabled group and 26 symptomatic patients from the non-disabled group with respect to any of the assessed factors. The disabled group showed a combination of the following variables as assessed at baseline: greater age, initial neck pain intensity, initial back pain, blurred vision, and anxiety but less dizziness, sensitivity to noise and neurotic or behavioural problems in childhood.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, University of Berne, Switzerland.
authors.forename: B P
authors.initials: BP
authors.lastname: Radanov
authors.forename: G
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Di Stefano
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Schnidrig
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Sturzenegger
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D001288:Attention; D003863:Depression / Q000150:complications / Q000523:psychology; D004185:Disability Evaluation; D006233:Persons with Disabilities / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D010555:Personality Inventory; D012050:Rehabilitation, Vocational / Q000523:psychology; D013315:Stress, Psychological / Q000150:complications*; D014911:Whiplash Injuries / Q000523:psychology* / Q000534:rehabilitation