For any client, there are countless reasons why work is "not a good idea". Every client has their own objections about getting back into work, but the thing is, these barriers might not be the same as the barriers that they readily talk to us about. For example, we might be working with a client up to a point where we feel like their work capacity is in order, their psychosocial functioning is going well, and we know the physical and psychological demands of a given job are appropriate.... … [Read more...]

To wrap up the series on the health benefits of work, I think it's time for us to explore how our own work environments impact our health as consultants. After all, how can we expect our clients to see work as good when we don't think so ourselves? So... it's time to bring out a guinea pig for this case study: Purple Co! We have worked really hard at Purple Co to create a work environment that supports the health and wellbeing of our team. But - we do it differently. Most health and … [Read more...]

There is always a lot of discussion around how we help people who have experienced a health event in their lives recover, rehabilitate and return to work (RTW). There are some common themes that arise whenever I read social media thread, a blog post or when I speak at conferences…. and that is: how do we motivate people to want to participate? Motivating our clients is somewhat easier when you have a big stick you can “motivate” them with. The threat of losing one’s financial security if one … [Read more...]

"I don't want to participate anymore." Have you heard this from a client before? What happens when our assumptions as rehabilitation professionals don’t align with the realities of our clients? You have spent time reading through a client’s file, developing rapport, taking a lot of notes, gaining an understanding of their condition, you research the evidence-based functional expectations of their recovery process, and in your mind you’ve started mapping out the process for recovery and … [Read more...]

Fear. This word has come up for me a lot lately in my work as a Rehabilitation Consultant. So many of our clients are driven by fear. Fear of failure. Fear of loss. Fear of judgement, of exile, of never being the same as they used to be before they got sick. Being able to identify fear in our clients is important. But identifying what's really driving that fear... Well, it takes time. It takes more questions. And it requires an understanding of what makes us behave the way we do. So … [Read more...]