The perceived benefits and barriers of sport in spinal cord injured individuals: a qualitative study

Abstract

Purpose: This study explores what individuals with spinal cord injury (SCI) perceive to be the benefits of becoming involved in organized sport and identifies the barriers to participation. Method: Seven SCI athletes from a variety of sports were interviewed in a semi-structured format. Results: 20 benefits and 18 individual barriers were identified and categorized into sub-themes: benefits were categorized into sub-themes of “socialization,” “self-worth,” “physical challenge” and “emotional.” Barriers were grouped into “organization,” “medical,” “emotional,” “a lack of available information” and “views held by others.” Conclusion: A variety of benefits from participating in sport were identified, including socialization, the acquisition of knowledge from others, the development of greater awareness of health and well-being issues, weight maintenance, functional development and independence. Barriers identified included financial constraints, the lack of information regarding medical complications and sporting opportunities, and the need for able-bodied support. The findings have implications for the rehabilitation of individuals with SCI.

Implications for Rehabiliation

• The findings of this study showed that there are many benefits to participating that included socialization (e.g. incidental learning from others), self-worth (e.g. proving physical strength to others), physical challenge (e.g. maintenance of body weight) and emotional (e.g. exercise providing an emotional outlet).

• There were also many barriers to participating including organizational (e.g. availability of facilities), medical (e.g. urinary tract infections), emotional (e.g. general lack of confidence), lack of relevant information (e.g. lack of or inappropriate medical advice) and views held by others (e.g. patronizing views of others).

Keywords::

• Paraplegia
• sport
• participation
• tetraplegia
• wheelchair sport
• spinal cord injury

Acknowledgements

We thank the participants for their time and contribution to this study.

Declaration of Interes:The authors report no conflicts of interest.