A qualitative study of individuals with acquired brain injury’ and program facilitators’ experiences in virtual ABI community support programs

Research Objectives: To describe the experiences of individuals with ABI and program facilitators who are respectively attending and facilitating virtual support programs.

Design: A descriptive qualitative study design using an inductive thematic analysis approach.

Setting: The interviews were conducted by telephone or Zoom.

Participants: Sixteen participants were recruited using purposeful sampling, including fourteen individuals with ABI (ten female and four male), three of whom were also program facilitators, as well as two program facilitators without ABI (a registered dietitian and recreation therapist).

Interventions: Participants attended or facilitated a virtual community-based ABI program.

Main Outcome Measures: Participants completed a semi-structured interview facilitated by an interview guide, informed by two previous studies of experiences in community-based programs. The purpose was to discuss their experiences in virtual ABI support programs such as, perceived benefits and challenges and suggestions for resources to improve program quality. The interviews were audio-recorded and transcribed, and de-identified. Thematic analysis approach was used to inductively analyze the transcripts. During the analysis, researchers read the transcripts to gain data immersion and developed themes and subthemes based on line-by-line coding of transcripts and pattern identification across transcripts.

Results: Three preliminary themes were identified. Theme one described the perceived benefits of joining including connecting with peers, gaining information and enhanced access to support programs. Theme two described the perceived challenges of virtual support programs including interpersonal (i.e., communication barriers), intrapersonal (i.e., physical symptoms) and environment and contextual (i.e., privacy concerns) challenges. Theme three described the considerations to facilitate participation in virtual programs such as, creating a safe and respectful environment (i.e., ensuring a non-judgemental environment) and, fostering engagement (i.e., asking open-ended questions) and managing challenging situations. Other considerations focused on enhancing inclusivity and accessibility such as, ensuring people know that programs exist and providing program materials in different formats.

Conclusions: This study described the experiences of virtual support programs for individuals with ABI and facilitators. The results may be used to enhance the quality of virtual programs ensuring programs are safe and respectful, engaging and accessible.

Author(s) Disclosures: N/A