Izabela Z. Schultz

E. Sally Rogers

Growing interest in the field of mental health in the workplace among policy makers, clinicians, and researchers alike has been fueled by equal employment rights legislation and increasing disability statistics in mental heath. The importance of addressing this topic is underscored by the fact that depression now ranks second on the hierarchy of occupational disabilities. The problem is compounded by a host of factors, including major difficulties in job retention and productivity experienced by persons with mental health disabilities; younger age and higher education of persons with mental health problems; and labor shortages and an aging workforce in many industrialized countries. In addition, particularly in the United States, the vocational needs of army veterans returning from duty with mental health disorders require system-based solutions and new rehabilitation approaches. The pressure created by these powerful legislative, societal, and economic forces has not been matched by the state of evidence-based practices in the field of employment retention and job accommodation in mental health. Current research evidence is fragmented, limited in scope, difficult to access, and adversely affected by the traditional divide between the fields of psychiatry and psychology on one hand and interdisciplinary employment research and practices on the other. As a result, policy makers, employers, disability compensation systems, and rehabilitation and disability management professionals have been left without a critical "how to" evidence-informed toolbox for occupational practices to accommodate and retain persons with mental health disabilities in the workplace. Currently, no single source of knowledge and research evidence exists in the field that would guide best practices. Yet the need for workplace accommodations for persons with mental health disabilities has been growing and, based on epidemiological trends, is anticipated to grow even more in the future. These trends leave physicians, psychologists, occupational therapists, vocational rehabilitation professionals, disability managers, human resource professionals, and policy makers poorly prepared to face the challenge of integrating and maintaining persons with mental health disabilities in the workplace. The aim of the Handbook is to close the gap between the needs of the professionals and networks that work with or study persons with mental heath disorders in an employment context and the actual knowledge base in the field. The Handbook will be written in language that can easily be understood by readers representing a multitude of disciplines and research paradigms spanning the mental health, rehabilitation, and employment fields of inquiry. The Handbook will contribute an integration of the best quantitative and qualitative research in the field, together with experts’ consensus, regarding effective work retention and accommodation strategies and practices in mental health. The book will consist of five major sections, divided into chapters written by recognized experts in these areas.

Work Accommodation and Retention in Mental Health

Robert J. Gatchel

This book integrates the growing clinical research evidence related to the emerging transdisciplinary field of occupational health and wellness. It includes a wide range of important topics, ranging from current conceptual approaches to health and wellness in the workplace, to common problems in the workplace such as presenteeism/abstenteeism, common illnesses, job-related burnout, to prevention and intervention methods. It consists of five major parts. Part I, “Introduction and Overviews,” provides an overview and critical evaluation of the emerging conceptual models that are currently driving the clinical research and practices in the field. This serves as the initial platform to help better understand the subsequent topics to be discussed. Part II, “Major Occupational Symptoms and Disorders,” exposes the reader to the types of critical occupational health risks that have been well documented, as well as the financial and productivity losses associated with them. In Part III, “Evaluation of Occupational Causes and Risks to Workers’ Health,” a comprehensive evaluation of these risks and causes of such occupational health threats is provided. This leads to Part IV, “Prevention and Intervention Methods,” which delineates methods to prevent or intervene with these potential occupational health issues. Part V, “Research, Evaluation, Diversity and Practice,” concludes the book with the review of epidemiological, measurement, diversity, policy, and practice issues–with guidelines on changes that are needed to decrease the economic and health care impact of illnesses in the workplace, and recommendations for future. All chapters provide a balance among theoretical models, current best-practice guidelines, and evidence-based documentation of such models and guidelines. The contributors were carefully selected for their unique knowledge, as well as their ability to meaningfully present this information in a comprehensive manner. As such, this Handbook is of great interest and use to health care and rehabilitation professionals, management and human resource personnel, researchers and academicians alike.

Handbook of Occupational Health and Wellness

Richard A. Young

Karin Olson

This progressive reference redefines qualitative research as a crucial component of evidence-based practice and assesses its current and future impact on healthcare. Its introductory section explains the value of sociocultural context in case conceptualization, and ways this evidence can be integrated with quantitative findings to inform and transform practice. The bulk of the book's chapters review qualitative research in diverse areas, including pain, trauma, heart disease, COPD, and disabling conditions, and examine ways of effectively evaluating and applying qualitative data. This seismic shift in perception moves the healing professions away from traditional one-size-fits-all thinking and toward responsive, patient-centered care. Among the topics in the Handbook: ·Examining qualitative alternatives to categorical representation. ·The World Health Organization model of health: what evidence is needed? ·Qualitative research in mental health and mental illness. ·Qualitative evidence in pediatrics. ·The contribution of qualitative research to medication adherence. ·Qualitative evidence in health policy analysis. The Handbook of Qualitative Health Research for Evidence-Based Practice offers health and clinical psychologists, rehabilitation specialists, occupational and physical therapists, nurses, family physicians and other primary care providers new ways for understanding patients' health-related experiences and opens up new ways for developing interventions intended to improve health outcomes.

Handbook of Qualitative Health Research for Evidence-Based Practice

This comprehensive interdisciplinary synthesis focuses on the clinical and occupational intervention processes enabling workers to return to their jobs and sustain employment after injury or serious illness as well as ideas for improving the wide range of outcomes of entry and re-entry into the workplace. Information is accessible along key theoretical, research, and interventive lines, emphasizing a palette of evidence-informed approaches to return to work and stay at work planning and implementation, in the context of disability prevention. Condition-specific chapters detail best return to work and stay at work practices across diverse medical and psychological diagnoses, from musculoskeletal disorders to cancer, from TBI to PTSD. The resulting collection bridges the gap between research evidence and practice and gives readers necessary information from a range of critical perspectives. Among the featured topics: Understanding motivation to return to work: economy of gains and losses. Overcoming barriers to return to work: behavioral and cultural change. Program evaluation in return to work: an integrative framework. Working with stakeholders in return to work processes. Return to work after major limb loss. Improving work outcomes among cancer survivors. Return to work among women with fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue syndrome. The Handbook of Return to Work is an invaluable, unique and comprehensive resource for health, rehabilitation, clinical, counselling and industrial psychologists, rehabilitation specialists, occupational and physical therapists, family and primary care physicians, psychiatrists and physical medicine and rehabilitation as well as occupational medicine specialists, case and disability managers and human resource professionals. Academics and researchers across these fields will also find expert guidance and direction in these pages. It is an essential reading for all return to work and stay at work stakeholders.

From Research to Practice

Handbook of Return to Work

Christopher T. Ray

This book discusses the state of the research and cutting-edge practice with regard to chronic illnesses and rehabilitation in older adults. It emphasizes biopsychosocial and culturally appropriate rehabilitation approaches to reduce the degree of disability and maximize independence in the activities of daily living among the burgeoning aging population. Organized in four sections—Introduction and Overview, Major Illnesses and Problems in Aging Populations, Evaluation of Functional Rehabilitation Approaches for Aging Populations, and Future Clinical Research Needs—the book includes chapters on the “graying” of the West with implications for increased chronic illnesses and disabilities; a review of biopsychosocial rehabilitation approaches; important “aging” issues such as slips-and-falls, musculoskeletal pain, chronic disabling conditions such as cancer and cardiovascular disease, and work-related factors to maintain work engagement in older workers. The US Census Bureau projects that by the year 2030, about 20% of the U.S. population will be 65 or older, contributing to the increased concern about healthcare and rehabilitation issues among older adults. /div This work will be of interest to healthcare, rehabilitation, vocational, human resource and disability management professionals, policy makers as well as researchers in areas of aging, gerontology, chronic illness, disability, rehabilitation, social work, medicine and psychology.

Izabela Z. Schultz

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