Identifying and Overcoming Psychosocial Barriers to Recovery from Work-related Musculoskeletal Disorders

This session will strive to normalize psychosocial risk factors and review the complexity of pain processing is in the human body. Whether the provider, claims adjustor, employer or employee, psychosocial risk factors impacting any party in the case could potentially impact the outcome. We will review the neuroscience behind psychosocial risk factors and pain processing and discuss how psychosocial risk factors can have an impact on both the pain experience as well as the outcome.

This program will emphasize the importance of compassionate communication and simple techniques to assist employees in coping and developing self-efficacy while managing their work-related injury. As well, we will be emphasizing the importance of interdisciplinary collaboration and communication to further benefit the employee's recovery.

Attendees will take away skills to put into practice with their employees, to assist with mitigation of psychosocial risk factors for all parties and improved outcomes for employees. Case studies and outcomes from programs utilizing these skills will be reviewed to demonstrate the impact of simple changes in care.