Describing the Composition of Individualized Education Plans for Students With Traumatic Brain Injury.

Purpose The purpose of this study was to explore and describe the features of Individualized Education Plans (IEPs) for a cohort of students with traumatic brain injury (TBI) to help elucidate current special education practices for students with TBI. Method We obtained permission from administrators of a local school district of 41,000 students in a Midwestern state to review de-identified IEP records of students verified with TBI. We examined demographic information (i.e., cause and age at time of injury), IEP services and intensity, IEP goal categories, and previous verification status. Results Descriptive results support that intervention services were more intense for students with TBI with greater lengths of time postinjury. Target behaviors within goals were more often related to math and reading than to the cognitive processes that govern these skills, such as attention, memory, and executive functioning. Finally, more than a third of our sample had been verified with a disability and were receiving special education services via an IEP prior to their TBI. Conclusions This work represents an important first step in understanding the special education services for students with TBI. Future research should explore interventions that are ecologically valid for school-based settings and are developed to address the idiosyncratic deficits of students with TBI, particularly interventions that focus on the underlying cognitive processes experienced by these students.

Speech-Language Pathologists' Comfort Providing Intervention to Children With Traumatic Brain Injury: Results From a National Survey.

Purpose This exploratory study examined speech-language pathologists' (SLPs) clinical experience and work environment characteristics impacting comfort with providing intervention to children with traumatic brain injury (TBI). Method This study included 162 SLPs who responded to a national survey about their comfort providing intervention to children with TBI, clinical experience (i.e., years of experience treating children with TBI, TBI preprofessional training and professional development, and licensure/credentialing), and work environment (i.e., work setting, caseload size, geographic location). Results Findings from latent class analysis revealed 3 distinct groups of SLPs based on their comfort with providing services to children with TBI: those with low comfort, moderate comfort, and high comfort. Further analyses revealed statistically significant differences across the 3 groups in the areas of years of experience treating children with TBI, professional development, work setting, TBI caseload size, and geographic location. Conclusions Our findings reveal that most SLPs feel comfortable providing intervention to children with TBI; however, differences in characteristics across groups suggest that specific steps can be taken to ensure increased comfort for all SLPs working with this population. Practicing SLPs may increase their level of comfort through professional development and hands-on, mentored experience with TBI. Efforts such as these may influence the quality of service provision and expand the population of SLPs who feel comfortable treating children with TBI. Future research is needed to further examine how comfort and SLP characteristics directly impact the quality of speech and language intervention and long-term outcomes of children with TBI.

Using the OSU TBI-ID method for screening rural, older adults: a mixed methods feasibility study.

Objective: To examine the feasibility of: (1) a brain injury and screening tool (Ohio State University Traumatic Brain Injury Identification Method; OSU TBI-ID) training for rural Area Agency on Aging (AAA) health professionals, and (2) implementation of the screening process.  Research Design: A mixed methods design was utilized to assess several aspects of feasibility. Quantitatively, the researchers examined AAA health professionals' scores on a brain injury misconceptions survey, descriptive statistics about the clients screened, and health professionals' accuracy using the OSU TBI-ID. Qualitative data was collected via focus group interviews with the health professionals.  Methods and Procedures: The researchers conducted brain injury education and screening tool training for AAA health professionals. Subsequently, the health professionals used the OSU TBI-ID to screen their older adult clients for brain injury.  Main Outcomes and Results: AAA health professionals learned the OSU TBI-ID quickly and used the protocol correctly. The screening results established that 15% of the clients screened positive for brain injury; of those with positive screens, 87% did not have a previous brain injury diagnosis.  Conclusions: The current study presents evidence of feasibility for (1) training AAA health professionals, and (2) implementation of the OSU TBI-ID to screen older adult clients.