TRAUMATIC BRAIN INJURY - FACTORS PREDICTING RETURN TO WORK OR SCHOOL

Prediction of outcome for brain-injured individuals will facilitate ef fective rehabilitation programme planning which will ultimately improv e the patient's quality of life. A sample of traumatic brain-injured s ubjects who had completed their rehabilitation were contacted post-dis charge to identify predictive factors for return to work/school. Subje cts were given a telephone interview and their charts were examined re trospectively along five subsets of variables in the predictive matrix : sociodemographics, chronicity, indices of severity, physical impairm ent, and cognitive functioning. Forty-five subjects were used as the s tudy sample to investigate their vocational and educational outcome, a nd to generate the best predictive model for return to work/school. Tw enty subjects made up the test sample used to evaluate the generalizab ility of the predictive model. Performance IQ score of the Wechsler Ad ult Intelligence Scale-Revised emerged as the most significant predict or of return to work/school. Implications of these findings for treatm ent and rehabilitation are discussed.