For this blog post, I found the
peer-reviewed article titled "Individual and Group Treatment for Patients with
Acquired Brain Injury in Comprehensive Rehabilitation" (Vestri et al., 2014). I was interested in reading
about how a group treatment would be led for individuals of this population. In
the study, the purpose was to test the hypothesis that group treatment would
lead to more improvement in individuals with this injury than just receiving individual
treatment alone. Since we learned about ABI in our neuro classes, I was intrigued to
learn about how group therapy could also help. This retrospective study
consisted of 74 patients divided into two groups. One group of participants
received only individual treatment while the other group received both
individual treatment and group treatments, and the groups were assessed before
the intervention and after the interventions. The individual treatment did not
have to be OT. It also included speech therapy, social worker meetings,
physiotherapy, cognitive rehabilitation, OT, or psychology. The group treatment
followed a structured plan including a welcoming phase, an activity phase based
on the participant’s level of functioning, and final phase of forming goals and
using skills learned. The group treatment allowed modeling, competition,
problem solving, and imitation to happen between the members. Following the
interventions, the results showed a greater improvement in FIM scores for the
individuals who participated in both the group treatment and the individual
treatment compared to the group that only received individual treatment.
For me, the most interesting aspect
of this study was that the physician determined which setting the participants
would be in, which ultimately determined which treatment group they were in.
Even though the physician was a part of the multidisciplinary team meeting, he
or she was the ultimate determiner of whether or not the participant received
group treatment. Initially, I thought that OT would be the best suited to make
this decision. I realize that not every individual received OT in this study, and
that the physician based his decision off multiple assessments. Also, the participants were required to have
certain abilities such as attention and being able to follow directions before
they could participant in group interventions. Another significant aspect of
this study was that the group treatment did not follow the seven-step format
for group leadership like we learned about in this class, but there was a clear
structure and phases in the group treatment. This structure was similar to
Cole’s seven steps because it started with a welcoming phase where the
participants got to know the other participants in their group and
collaborated, while Cole’s process includes an introduction that is similar. In
this study, there was also an activity phase and then a final phase that is
similar to the application and generalizing phase in Cole’s process. The activity
phase included activities such as packing, basket weaving, and woodcarving. In
the last phase of the study, the participants focused on a plan for the future
and examining the skills attained in the other phases, which is similar to the
application phase in Cole’s seven steps.
Having read this study, I now
realize just how important it is to have group treatment. The individuals who
received the group treatment, in addition to their individual treatment, had
better outcomes in function than the individuals who only received
individualized treatment. The group treatment allowed for social interactions,
teamwork, problem solving, and emotional support. Personally, I think a follow-up study to see if the results still
held true between the two groups relating to the client's function would be interesting. The study mentions that group treatment is
cost-effective, holistic, and requires a lot of planning. This makes me feel
more interested in learning about how to involve group treatment into my
interventions in the future.
Reference:
Vestri,
A., Peruch, F., Marchi, S., Frare, M., Guerra, P., Pizzighello, S., & ...
Martinuzzi, A. (2014). Individual and group treatment for patients with
acquired brain injury in comprehensive rehabilitation. Brain Injury, 28(8),
1102-1108. doi:10.3109/02699052.2014.910698
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