Venue: The Fuqua School of Business, Duke University, 1 Towerview Drive, Durham, NC 27708-0120

 

Presentation

The Effects of Activities of Daily Living Assistance Needs on Self and Other Household Income Generation of Individuals with Spinal Cord Injury

Authors: W. David Bradford (Medical University of South Carolina); James S. Krause (Center for Spinal Cord Injury); Clara E. Dismuke (Medical University of South Carolina)

Presenter: Clara E. Dismuke (Medical University of South Carolina)

Discussant: Padmaja Ayyagari (Duke University)

Session: Work & Disability

Room: Seminar C

When: Monday 8:30 a.m. - 10 a.m.

Objectives: Identify the effects of Activities of Daily Living (ADLs) assistance needs on labor market and other sources of household income of individuals with Spinal Cord Injury (SCI)

Design: Secondary analysis of cross-sectional survey data.

Setting: A Midwestern university hospital and a private hospital in the Southeastern USA.

Participants: All 1,367 participants are adults between the ages of 18 and 64 who had a traumatic SCI at least one year prior to study initiation.

Methods: A binary probit model of self and other household income generation was estimated for three different samples: all individuals, married individuals, and married males with SCI to examine the effects of ADL assistance needs across different groups.

Results: Only communication ADL assistance needs were consistent across the three samples. In each sample, increased communication ADL assistance needs decreased the likelihood that the individual with SCI was the sole income earner and increased the likelihood that income was generated both by the individual with SCI and other sources of household income

Conclusions: It is possible that communication ADL assistance needs may be the easiest to address from a public policy perspective either through state or federal subsidies of available communication assistance devices and training to increase the ability of severely disabled individuals such as those with SCI to financially sustain their households after injury.