Vocational Rehabilitation For Life Care Planners

1
Vocational Rehabilitation ForLife
Care Planners

• Howard Caston, PhD

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Introduction

• Background
• Overview
• Relevance to life care planning
• Related to the objectives

3
Overview

• Vocational Evaluation
• Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA)
• Vocational rehabilitation resources

4
Vocational Evaluation

• Reason for referral
• Work History
• Education
• Training
• Testing
• Clinical observations
• Medical status
• Social
• Motivation
• Transferability of skills analysis (TSA)
• Labor market analysis
• Other

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Pre-evaluation conference

• Discuss with attorney
• Staff with agency
• Discuss with case manager

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Reason for referral

• Rehabilitation assessment
• Return to Work
• Training
• Earnings capacity
• Costs
• File review
• Litigation only
• Agency specific

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Interview

• Should be structured
• Have appropriate intake form
• Explain purpose
• Discuss confidentiality
• Explain reasons for testing
• Prepare for discussion of outcomes with
  client/family
• Validate data
• Notice pain behaviors
• Unusual statements/behaviors

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Work History

• Jobs/resume
• Job descriptions-accurate
• Primary duties
• Worker characteristics

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Analysis of work history

• Job titles
• DOT numbers
• Physical demands
• Educational requirements
• Supervision
• Complexity
• Training time

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Testing

• Achievement
• Aptitude
• Interests
• Questionnaire
• Psychological

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Achievement testing

• Reading
• Math
• Spelling
• Basic academic levels
• Scoring-grade level/percentile
• Example-WRAT

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Aptitude testing

• General
• Verbal
• Numerical
• Clerical
• Motor cord
• Finger dexterity
• Eye-hand-foot
• Color discrimination

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Aptitude

• Usually pencil/paper or dexterity
• Normed on age/industrial group
• Face validity
• Commercial
• Examples-DAT, GATB, OASIS
• Work sample systems valpar, work simulators,
  etc.

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Interest

• Questions about vocational and life interests
• Similar jobs
• Similar interests of workers
• Examples-Strong, Career Assessment, Self-directed
  Search.

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Clinical observations

• Attention/concentration
• Ability to follow instuctions
• Interpersonal communication
• Personal appearance
• Tolerance
• Verbal motivation
• Demonstrated motivation
• Memory

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Transferable skills analysis (TSA)

• Physical demand
• Aptitudes
• General Educational Development (GED)
• Specific Vocational Preparation (SVP)
• Environmental Conditions
• Temperaments

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Physical Demands Lifting

• Sedentary
• Light
• Medium
• Heavy
• Very heavy

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Physical DemandsFunctional Capacities

• Climbing
• Balancing
• Stooping
• Kneeling
• Crouching
• Crawling
• Reaching
• Handling

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Physical DemandsFunctional Capacities (Contd.)

• Fingering
• Feeling
• Talking
• Hearing
• Tasting/smelling
• Near/far acuity
• Depth perception
• Accommodation
• Color and field of vision

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Aptitudes

• G-Intelligence
• V-Verbal
• N-Numerical
• S-Spatial
• P-Form perception
• Q-Clerical perception
• K-Motor coordination
• F-Finger dexterity
• M-Manual dexterity
• E-Eye-hand-foot coordination
• C-Color discrimination

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General Educational Development (GED)

• Reasoning
• Mathematics
• Language

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Specific Vocational Preparation (SVP)
Level

• 1 Short demonstration
• 2 Up to one month
• 3 One month to three months
• 4 Three months to six months
• 5 Six months to one year
• 6 One year to two years
• 7 Two to four years
• 8 Four to ten years
• 9 Over ten years

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Skill Level

• Unskilled SVP 1-2
• Semi-skilled SVP 3-4
• Skilled SVP 5-9

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Environmental Conditions

• Exposure to Weather
• Extreme cold
• Extreme heat
• Wet and/or humid
• Noise intensity
• Vibration
• Atmospheric conditions
• Hazards

N-not present O-occasionally F-frequently C-consta
ntly
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Temperaments

• A - working alone
• D - controlling/planning activities
• E - expressing personal feelings
• I - influencing people
• J - making judgments and decisions
• P - dealing with people
• R - performing routine activities
• S - performing under stress
• T - attaining precise tolerances
• U - working under specific instructions
• V- performing a variety of duties

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Process of analysis

• Prioritize factors
• Manual analysis
• Computerized report
• Labor market relevance

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Labor market analysis

• Computerized search
• Internal data base
• ONET-links to jobs
• Local advertised jobs
• Internet web sites
• Confer with job developer
• Other

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American with Disabilities Act (ADA)

• Employment
• Public accommodations
• Transportation
• State and local government

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ADA-Employment

• It is unlawful for an employer to discriminate
  against a qualified individual with a disability
  who can perform the essential functions of the
  job with or without reasonable accommodation that
  does not provide undue hardship on an employer.

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Disability

• Any physical/mental condition that causes a
  substantial limitation of a major life activity.

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Major life activity

• Self care
• Walking
• Seeing
• Hearing
• Speaking
• Learning
• Working
• Sitting

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Examples of disability

• Paraplegia
• Learning disabled
• Schizophrenia
• Record of impairment
• Perceived as being disabled

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Exclusions

• Temporary conditions
• Nearsighted
• Flu
• Skin disorder that prevents shaving
• Left handedness
• Raised in Kentucky
• Addiction to Big Macs

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Discrimination

• Segregating/classifying
• Using administration methods
• Not making reasonable accommodations
• Using inappropriate tests to screen
• Hiring
• Promotion policy
• Retaliation
• Prohibited medical exams
• Reassignment
• alary

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Qualified individual

• Knowledge of the essential functions
• Education
• Experience
• Specific skills
• licenses

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Essential functions

• Job description
• Employers judgment
• Duties
• Equipment
• Environmental
• Functional requirements
• Production standards

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Reasonable AccommodationAreas covered

• Application process
• Work environment
• Benefits

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Examples of accommodation

• Job restructuring
• Rehab engineering
• Modified work schedules
• Qualified readers/interpreters
• Telecommuting
• Paid leave/FMLA/unpaid leave
• Reserved parking places
• Transitional work
• Change duties

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Case examples

• Back injury-change duties, job swapping, change
  duties, engineering
• Hearing impairments-hearing aide device, noise
  reduction, interpreter
• Visual impairment-large print type, voice text,
  coach
• Learning disabled-job coach, longer training
  time, longer time for work
• TBI-written detailed job description, visual
  clues, computer aided prompting
• Psychiatric- reduced interpersonal, low stress,
  distribute medications

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Undue hardship

• Cost to employer
• Extensive
• Substantial
• Disruptive
• Fundamentally alter the job
• Affect other employees
• Unsafe

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Cases

• U.S. Airways Inc. v. Barnett-seniority prevails
  usually
• Chevron USA Inc. v Echazabal- can reject
  workers at risk to own health
• U.S. v. Cinemark USA, Inc.- Line of sight for
  movies.
• Toyota

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SummaryObjectives

• Vocational testing
• Vocational rehabilitation evaluation
• ADA

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Class Evaluation/Assessment Grading

• Project
• Exam