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BRIEF RESEARCH REPORT article

Front. Psychiatry
Sec. Mental Health Occupational Therapy
Volume 15 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fpsyt.2024.1377157
This article is part of the Research Topic Editors' Showcase: Mental Health Occupational Therapy View all 9 articles

Occupational Therapy Treatment of Public Safety Personnel with Work-related Psychological Injuries: Analyzing Ontario Worker's Compensation Data from 2017-2021

Provisionally accepted
Megan Edgelow Megan Edgelow *Agnieszka Fecica Agnieszka Fecica
  • Queen's University, Kingston, Canada

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    This study aimed to explored the usage of occupational therapy treatment with psychologically injured public safety personnel (PSP) from Ontario, Canada. We used a descriptive quantitative approach with summary data provided by the Workplace Safety and Insurance Board (WSIB) of Ontario documenting occupation therapy (OT) treatment of psychologically injured PSP who had an approved WSIB Mental Stress Injury Program (MSIP) claim between 2017 and 2021.Variables examined included demographics, career type, injury type, and return to work (RTW) outcomes. Chi-square Tests of Independence were used to compare differences between PSP who received OT treatment and those who did not. Analysis revealed that in the total cohort of 6674 approved PSP MSIP claims, 15% (n = 991) of PSP received OT treatment. Communicators (21%) and correctional workers (17%) were most likely to receive OT treatment while paramedics (13%) were less likely. PSP claimants who received OT treatment were more likely to have a cumulative event injury (71%) compared to the rest of the cohort (55%) and were more likely to not have started a RTW process (62%) compared to the rest of the cohort (43%). PSP who received OT treatment had more days away from work on average than those who did not (913 days vs. 384 days). This data reveals that PSP with cumulative injuries and higher lengths of time away from work more frequently received OT treatment as part of their WSIB MSIP claim; it is possible that this higher degree of claim complexity influenced their RTW outcomes.

    Keywords: Occupational therapy (MeSH), Public safety personnel, Occupational Health, Return to work (RTW), PTSD - Posttraumatic stress disorder, First Responders

    Received: 26 Jan 2024; Accepted: 28 Nov 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Edgelow and Fecica. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Megan Edgelow, Queen's University, Kingston, Canada

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.