OTQualitativeWork (Reading, Mass.)2024

Employer representatives' experiences of supporting employees with cognitive impairments in a digital work environment.

Monika Lindberg, Maria Larsson-Lund, Anna Berg Jansson and 1 others

PMID 38820057

WHAT IT FOUND

Six Swedish employer representatives described supporting employees with cognitive impairments in digital workplaces as an ongoing struggle.

They felt isolated and unsupported by occupational health services, which they said focused on physical ergonomics and medical check-ups while ignoring cognitive demands.

Key findings

01Participants perceived that support from occupational health care was insufficient because it focused on medical check-ups, physical impairments and physical ergonomics but hardly never on cognitive impairments or cognitive ergonomics.

02Employer representatives felt alone and abandoned, emphasizing the need to establish a functioning support system to facilitate work environment management and vocational rehabilitation.

03Managing the work environment was described as an ongoing process that needed continuous mastery, as new risks and needs constantly arose.

STILL TO COME

How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for OTs

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What it does not show

The sample size was very small (six participants), recruited through snowball and internet sampling over five months. This limits the transferability of the findings to other contexts or sectors. The participants were all from Sweden, where specific legal obligations for employers and a distinct structure for occupational health services exist. These findings may not apply to countries with different employment laws or healthcare systems. The study only captures the perspective of employer representatives. It does not include the views of the employees with cognitive impairments themselves, so the description of their needs and experiences is filtered entirely through the managers' and HR personnel's perceptions. The recruitment process was difficult, with over one hundred invitations sent to yield six participants. This suggests that employer representatives with this specific experience are rare or hesitant to participate, which may introduce a selection bias toward those with particularly strong feelings or experiences.

Declared interests

The text does not report any conflicts of interest or funding sources.

The easy way to misread this

Do not interpret the participants' feeling of being unsupported by occupational health services as evidence that current services are objectively inadequate or that occupational therapists are failing in their roles. This is the subjective experience of six Swedish managers, not an audit of clinical practice.

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