title: Early access to vocational rehabilitation for spinal cord injury inpatients.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To describe a novel early vocational rehabilitation programme (In-Voc) for inpatients with spinal cord injury and to report early vocational outcomes.
  
  
  METHODS
  Observational longitudinal cohort study.
  
  
  METHODS
  One hundred adults with spinal cord injury admitted to spinal units in Sydney, Australia within a 24-month period.
  
  
  METHODS
  In-Voc was offered to all inpatients within the first 6 months of acquired spinal cord injury and was provided by trained vocational consultants. Baseline demographics, opinions about work readiness, details of the vocational services provided and preliminary employment outcomes were documented.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The In-Voc programme was relatively short in duration (median 11 weeks, range 3-39 weeks) with a median total of 9.1 h (range 1-75.2 h) of service delivered per participant. At case closure (median 3 weeks post-discharge), 29/84 (34.5%) of participants were in paid employment (7% full-time, 8% part-time, 7% on sick leave, and 12% working with hours unknown), 36% were unemployed (6% seeking work, 16% not seeking work, 14% job seeking status unknown), 13% were students or in-training, and 17% were in vocational rehabilitation.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Our research suggests that implementing an early vocational rehabilitation programme with individuals in the hospital setting is feasible and has good potential for enhancing post-injury labour-force participation.
authors.affiliation: John Walsh Centre for Rehabilitation Research, Sydney Medical School Northern, 2065 Sydney, Australia, Australia. james.middleton@sydney.edu.au, j.middleton@usyd.edu.au.
authors.forename: James W
authors.initials: JW
authors.lastname: Middleton
authors.forename: Deborah
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Johnston
authors.forename: Gregory
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Murphy
authors.forename: Kumaran
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Ramakrishnan
authors.forename: Nerida
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Savage
authors.forename: Rachel
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Harper
authors.forename: Jacquelyn
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Compton
authors.forename: Ian D
authors.initials: ID
authors.lastname: Cameron
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D015331:Cohort Studies; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008137:Longitudinal Studies; D008297:Male; D012050:Rehabilitation, Vocational / Q000379:methods*; D013119:Spinal Cord Injuries / Q000534:rehabilitation*