Extending technology-aided leisure and communication programs to persons with spinal cord injury and post-coma multiple disabilities

Purpose: These two studies extended technology-aided programs to promote leisure and communication opportunities to a man with cervical spinal cord injury and a post-coma man with multiple disabilities. Method: The studies involved the use of ABAB designs, in which A and B represented baseline and intervention phases, respectively. The programs focused on enabling the participants to activate songs, videos, requests, text messages, and telephone calls. These options were presented on a computer screen and activated through a small pressure microswitch by the man with spinal cord injury and a special touch screen by the post-coma man. To help the latter participant, who had no verbal skills, with requests and telephone calls, series of words and phrases were made available that he could activate in those situations. Results: Data showed that both participants were successful in managing the programs arranged for them. The man with spinal cord injury activated mean frequencies of above five options per 10-min session. The post-coma man activated mean frequencies of about 12 options per 20-min session. Conclusions: Technology-aided programs for promoting leisure and communication opportunities might be successfully tailored to persons with spinal cord injury and persons with post-coma multiple disabilities.

• Implications for Rehabilitation

• Technology-aided programs may be critical to enable persons with pervasive motor impairment to engage in leisure activities and communication events independently.

• Persons with spinal cord injury, post-coma extended brain damage, and forms of neurodegenerative disease, such as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, may benefit from those programs.

• The programs could be adapted to the participants’ characteristics, both in terms of technology and contents, so as to improve their overall impact on the participants’ functioning and general mood.