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APHA Scientific Session and Event Listing

Laura S. Lorenz, MEd, The Heller School for Social Policy and Management, Brandeis University, 56 Chase Road, Marlboro, MA 01752, 508-624-0555, llorenz@brandeis.edu

Traumatic brain injury (TBI) is a silent epidemic that affects at least 1.4 million people in the U.S. each year. An estimated 5.3 million Americans are living with disabilities resulting from TBI, and another 80,000 to 90,000 people join their numbers annually. Research that provides a deeper understanding of the patient's perspective can provide clinicians and others with valuable insights into the lives of TBI survivors and the facilitators and barriers to recovery from their point of view. This past fall I carried out a pre-pilot study “Facilitators and Barriers to Recovery from Traumatic Brain Injury: Through the Lens of Photovoice” with approval from the Brandeis Human Subjects Research Committee and recruited one respondent. I asked her to take photographs of living with TBI and facilitators and barriers to recovery from her perspective using a disposable camera with 27 exposures. She finished her camera after three weeks, and we met a week later to discuss her pictures. Some photographs were symbolic, others were representational. She told me what each photograph meant for her, why she had taken it, and how she had settled on or created the image. This poster presents a narrative analysis of 15 of her photographs and their interview excerpts following an approach suggested by Elliot Mishler (2004). Grouped into three categories (problem, action, and resolution), her photographs and interview data tell of her joy in completing simple tasks, her gradual improvement over time, and her sense of inner pride and hope for the future.

Learning Objectives: At the conclusion of this poster session, the learner will be able to

• Articulate facilitators and barriers to recovery from traumatic brain injury from a survivor’s perspective.
• Discuss the use of narrative analysis methods to analyze photographs and interview text.
• Identify ways to adapt this approach to his or her health care or research context.

Keywords: Traumatic Brain Injury, Patient Perspective

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Not Answered

Handout (.pdf format, 6681.5 kb)