@article{ref1,
title="Availability and need of home adaptations for personal mobility among individuals with spinal cord injury",
journal="Journal of spinal cord medicine",
year="2018",
author="Hertig-Godeschalk, Anneke and Gemperli, Armin and Arnet, Ursina and Hinrichs, Timo",
volume="41",
number="1",
pages="91-101",
abstract="OBJECTIVE: To identify the availability and unmet need of home adaptations (HAs) among the Swiss population with spinal cord injury (SCI). <br><br>DESIGN: Cross-sectional study. SETTING: Swiss Spinal Cord Injury Community Survey 2012. PARTICIPANTS: Individuals aged 16 or older with chronic SCI living in Switzerland. INTERVENTIONS: Not applicable. OUTCOME MEASURES: The availability of ten HAs (self-report) was analyzed by sex, age, living situation, indoor mobility, SCI severity, SCI etiology and time since SCI. The unmet need (self-report of not having a HA but needing it) of HAs was analyzed by financial hardship. <br><br>RESULTS: Among the 482 study participants (mean age 55.2 years, standard deviation 15.0 years, 71.6% males), 85.1% had at least one HA. The most frequent HA was a wheelchair accessible shower (62.7%). Availability of HAs markedly varied with indoor mobility (e.g. 38.4% of participants using a wheelchair had a stair lift compared to 17.4% of those walking) and with SCI severity (e.g. 54.8% of those with complete paraplegia had a wheelchair accessible kitchen worktop compared to 26.0% of those with incomplete paraplegia). Unmet need was highest for adjustable kitchen worktops (78.7% of those with a need) and adjustable kitchen cabinets (75.7%) and lowest for wheelchair accessible showers (9.4%) and grab bars next to the toilet (8.5%). No significant differences in unmet need were found when stratifying for financial hardship. <br><br>CONCLUSION: Availability of HAs is dependent on indoor mobility and SCI severity. There is a considerable degree of unmet need for selected HAs, which couldn't be explained by financial hardship.<p /> <p>Language: en</p>",
language="en",
issn="1079-0268",
doi="10.1080/10790268.2017.1308995",
url="http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/10790268.2017.1308995"
}