Intervention challenges experienced in physiotherapy and occupational therapy with workers' pain and disability...

Area of Science:

• Occupational health psychology
• Rehabilitation science
• Clinical psychology

Background:

• Worker-held representations of pain and disability significantly influence rehabilitation outcomes.
• Understanding these representations is crucial for effective clinical interventions in work disability.

Purpose of the Study:

• To identify prevalent unhelpful worker-held pain and disability representations.
• To explore the intervention challenges faced by clinicians when addressing these representations.

Main Methods:

• An explanatory sequential mixed-methods design (quantitative followed by qualitative) was employed.
• Secondary analysis of the Revised Illness Perception Questionnaire for Work Disability (n=297) identified representations.
• Semi-structured interviews with physiotherapists (n=8) and occupational therapists (n=6) explored intervention challenges.

Main Results:

• Prevalent unhelpful representations included perceptions of severe consequences, unpredictable symptoms, and negative emotions.
• Clinicians identified two key challenging patterns: uncontrollable pain leading to helplessness, and biomedical beliefs hindering active rehabilitation.
• Both patterns were found to impede worker engagement in rehabilitation treatment.

Conclusions:

• Two distinct pain and disability representation patterns pose significant challenges for clinicians.
• Addressing these unhelpful worker representations is critical for successful work rehabilitation.
• A transdisciplinary intervention approach is needed to integrate representation awareness into clinical practice.