Social disconnectedness and perceived social isolation in persons with spinal cord injury/dysfunction living in the community: A scoping review

Objective(s): To explore what is known about social disconnectedness and perceived social isolation (PSI) for adults with spinal cord injury/dysfunction (SCI/D) living in the community.

Data Sources: A computer assisted search of four online databases was completed on all articles published until May 18th, 2021. Grey literature and key agencies were searched for relevant documents.

Study Selection: Eligibility criteria included: 1) any study design except for quantitative case studies; 2) full-text articles including adults with an adult-onset traumatic or non-traumatic SCI/D living either at home or in a congregate setting; 3) explicitly investigated or explored social disconnectedness or PSI as outcomes or phenomena of interest; and 4) not a conference publication. All records were double screened by two reviewers. Following initial screening, 83 of 1,988 records met the eligibility criteria.

Data Extraction: Key data included participant characteristics, outcome measures used to collect social disconnectedness and PSI and results related to these constructs were collected. A quality assessment of the articles was not conducted.

Data Synthesis: Descriptive numerical analysis and thematic analysis were used to analyze the results. Descriptive numerical analysis involved summarizing the number of articles that met a certain criterion. For thematic analysis, findings were collated based on the guiding research questions.

Conclusions: Thirty-seven articles met the inclusion criteria. The findings suggest that social disconnectedness and PSI are potentially influenced by individual characteristics, social support, psychological well-being, participation in activities, the built environment and physical health. More work is needed to better understand these constructs to develop targeted interventions that help mitigate the impact of these phenomena on the SCI/D population.

Author(s) Disclosures: There are no disclosures for any of the authors on this proposal.