The COVID-19 pandemic disrupted daily life for nearly every individual on the planet, and its effects are still being felt today. Emerging evidence suggests that pandemic-related policies may have been particularly detrimental to individuals with chronic disabilities such as traumatic brain injury (TBI). For example, many individuals with TBI already find it challenging to participate in community activities because of their disability. “Lockdown” policies during the pandemic could have further limited their opportunity to be engaged in their communities.
Intrigued by this question, Institute scientists Umesh Venkatesan, PhD, and Amanda Rabinowitz, PhD, worked with a team of investigators from the National TBI Model Systems (TBIMS) to study the effects of the pandemic on societal participation in data from TBIMS enrollees nationwide. Societal participation was self-reported by each participant with TBI over telephone and covered three domains: productive activity (e.g., household chores), social activity (e.g., spending time with friends and family), and community involvement (e.g., dining out). Because of the extensiveness of the TBIMS project, the researchers had access to data from over 7,000 individuals who either reported their participation level in the five years before the pandemic started (before March 2020) or during roughly the first year of the pandemic. The investigators compared participation levels between these two groups of individuals to determine whether there were any changes, and to identify any differences in the demographic or clinical factors that related to participation (e.g., age or disability severity).
The study findings, recently published in Archives of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, show that participation levels among TBIMS enrollees were quite stable in the five years leading up to the pandemic, and these levels remained so during the pandemic in two domains: productive activity and social activity. However, community involvement saw a modest, but significant, decrease among people with TBI during the pandemic. These findings are consistent with pandemic-related lockdowns that limited activity outside the home. People often found ways to do things around the house and to stay socially connected (e.g., virtually), but eating out or going to the movies was off limits for many. Furthermore, the study found no differences between time periods in the demographic or clinical factors that were related to participation.
