Psychological Effects of Hands-On Training Using Public Transportation among Inpatients with Physical Disabilities: Analysis of the Self-Efficacy and Perception of Occupational Enablement Using a Multimethod Design

INTRODUCTION: This study is aimed at understanding how practicing the use of public transportation can affect the self-efficacy and perceptions of occupational enablement among patients with physical disabilities in a recovery rehabilitation hospital. METHOD: We recruited 21 inpatients with physical disabilities caused by stroke or orthopedic diseases from a recovery rehabilitation hospital in Japan and used a multimethod design including an intervention study and a follow-up survey. The intervention study utilized a before-after trial and provided hands-on training in the use of public transportation as the intervention. How self-efficacy and perceptions of occupational enablement changed before and after the intervention was measured using the visual analog scale (VAS). The follow-up survey was conducted to investigate whether patients used public transportation postdischarge. RESULTS: Only differences in the VAS scores regarding self-efficacy were significant between before and after the hands-on training in the use of public transportation, whereas differences regarding the perceptions of occupation enablement were not. Self-efficacy after the intervention was higher than that before the intervention. In the follow-up survey, both VAS scores of the psychological factors were significantly higher in the group that used public transportation postdischarge than in the group that did not. CONCLUSION: Providing hands-on training in the use of public transportation for inpatients with physical disabilities increased their self-efficacy, indicating that psychological factors should be evaluated to predict their occupational skill improvement and to verify the outcomes of an occupational therapeutic intervention.