Webcast-RRTC and DRRP

On Tuesday, July 26, Dr. Krause, PI of the RRTC and DRRP grants, presented our first webcast, titled, “Racial Disparities in Outcomes after Spinal Cord Injury (SCI): Twenty Years of Research.” The webcast was 90 minutes and was published through the Baylor College of Medicine Center for Interactive and Collaborative Technology. As part of our DRRP and RRTC grants, our team will be conducting webcasts related to our research findings to provide technical assistance to professionals wishing to develop similar research programs or prevention strategies based on the study results. Our webcasts will also serve to provide recommendations to broader audiences including consumers and their families, service providers, and policymakers.

The purpose of the first webcast presentation was to:
• Describe multiple studies we have conducted related to outcomes after SCI
• Highlight comparisons as a function of race/ethnicity
• Discuss the practical implications of these findings for underrepresented populations
• Discuss needs for future research.

In the presentation, Dr. Krause discussed the data from the SCI Model Systems, longitudinal study from inpatient rehabilitation, and the Minnesota/Georgia Aging Study. He described previous research findings on employment, education, income, and vocational interests as they relate to gender and race. Dr. Krause discussed that education is key to return to work after SCI and it has been found that minorities experience lower employment rates than Caucasians. In addition, it was found that women and minorities that do work after SCI earn lower incomes than non-minorities and males. Dr. Krause also discussed changes in interest over time in vocational interests and stated that research has found that black men and women reported more decrease in interests over time and non- minorities illustrate more stability in interests over time. We had sixty participants view the first webcast online and look forward to presenting our next webcast in late winter or early spring 2012.

Questions from audience:
Can you speak about age less than 50 and its affect please?
In both studies, being over the age of 50 at the time of the study was associated with a decreased likelihood of being employed. It was not associated with different conditional earnings, but was associated with lower unconditional earnings. What this means is that those over the age of 50 are less likely to be employed. However, if employed, their earnings are not significantly different than those of younger age groups. As a group, their unconditional earnings will be lower, but this is due to the lower employment rate and not the earnings among those who were employed.

Do these data take into consideration *when* education was acquired? In other words, was education obtained before, during or after injury? And what was the rationale for excluding students?
There was no differentiation between pre-injury and post-injury education in this study. However, in other studies, having completed their education prior to injury is associated with a faster return to work. Completing educational milestones after injury is associated with higher employment rates.