Community Reintegration

Persons with spinal cord injury (SCI) face extraordinary challenges beyond adapting to the physical aspects of their injury. They may also be confronted with functional limitations, and most importantly restrictions in participation within his or her physical and psychosocial environment. Considering this, a key goal of rehabilitation of persons with SCI is the reintegration into the community.123

Martin is not only an accident survivor, but also a career-seeker. Martin and his rehabilitation team already took steps toward community reintegration at the beginning of his rehabilitation, and these initial steps centred around returning to work.

The assessment of Martin's functioning in his new Rehab-Cycle^® highlighted a number of outstanding problems as well as strengths acquired during the first months of his rehabilitation that could impact his community reintegration.

At the end of Martin's first Rehab-Cycle^® it was clear that the next phase of rehabilitation would need to intensify its focus on community reintegration. While his previous long-term global goal of independent living remained unchanged in Martin's new Rehab-Cycle^®, his service-program goal was redefined as 'transition to community'.

The intervention targets identified for Martin's second Rehab-Cycle^® was assigned to specific members of the rehabilitation team – physician, physical therapist, occupational therapist, psychologist, social worker, and vocational rehabilitation (VR) counsellor to provide appropriate interventions to address the targets.

Shortly before discharge to the community, Martin’s functioning status was re-evaluated, a final rating of the intervention targets based on the evaluation was given and compared to the rating given in the first assessment to determine Martin's goal achievement.

I live with the things that I have and those that I can do, not with the things that I have lost.

Martin, after his discharge

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