COVID or no COVID, I am always in quarantine: Adapting to tetraplegia in Bangladesh during the pandemic

ABSTRACT

This paper aimed to explore the experience of a person with tetraplegia living in Bangladesh and adapting to spinal cord injury (SCI) in the time of COVID-19. A semi-structured interview was performed to collect the data to conduct this single case study research. Ethics has been sought before the study. Four themes were generated from the study that focused the challenges and adopted strategies to overcome those, such as fear and stress, loss of productive participation, disrupted relationship with friends and teachers, and economic challenges. The study findings suggest special attention to provide occupational therapy intervention for future patient including psychosocial care and facilitating meaningful occupational participation and role balance of a person with tetraplegia to adjust with this collective catastrophe. A series of research work would facilitate to develop occupational therapy role in this emerging field in Bangladesh.

KEYWORDS:

• COVID-19
• mental health
• spinal cord injury
• tetraplegia
• quarantine
• Bangladesh

Acknowledgements

The authors acknowledges the participant and family for their time and cooperation during data collection.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).