Outcome of microeconomic initiatives: applied among spinal cord injury patients at Centre for the Rehabilitation of the Paralysed.

Abstract

Purpose: As per WHO, it is estimated that 15% of the total population of the world from different regions is experiencing some form of disability. Among them, 2-4% population with disabilities are experiencing significant challenges in working and functioning in their day-to-day life. Disability is considered a chronic impairment promoting social and financial drawbacks, deprived of basic rights with constrained changes of having accessibility in the community. This study was conducted to find out the prevalence outcome of microeconomic outcome projects that have been applied among spinal cord injured patients who had taken rehabilitation services from the Centre for the Rehabilitation of the Paralysed. Aim: To determine the outcome of socioeconomic status of people with spinal cord injury who received cash grant support for livelihood through the microeconomic initiative program. Methods: A comparative cross-sectional study design was used. 246 data were collected from the microeconomic initiatives project which has been conducted at Centre for the Rehabilitation of the Paralysed. Socio-demographic data, disease and disability related data, trade related data, business income and expenditure data, communication and skill development data, challenges and risk related data, social inclusion and other data related to socioeconomic status were collected. Primarily the final monitoring from developed by MEI project, ICRC was used for data collection. The data was collected using face to face interview from the participants of the project. Sampling: Purposive sampling was used in accordance of inclusion and exclusion criteria. Data collection: A structured questionnaire containing total 37 questions were formulated after reviewing previous studies conducted in other countries under the MEI theme to collect the data from the person with spinal cord injury. Expert on the MEI questionnaire data collection visited the participants house and business place directly and collect the data. Total 246 participants from the following project from the year of 2028 to 2023 participated in the data collection process. To collect data from the person with spinal cord injury, a structured questionnaire was used which is already developed by ICRC. Results: In the quantitative study, 246 participants attended where 89% were male and 11% were female. Among the 246 participants 70.7% mentioned that now they are able to participate in social and family programs along with can provide their opinion while making decisions. 23.6% informed that now they take participation on the community events only. 5.7% mentioned that still they cannot ensure the social inclusion as a person with disability. While analyzing the project final status, the result state that 69% project participants successfully completed all the project policies and they are still running the business very successfully. 20% mentioned they need more time to achieve the success of the project. 11% failed in the project to run the business due to associated causes. There is a strong significance between the final state of the project with the social inclusion of the project participants (x^2=25.007, df=4, p= .000). Final outcome indicating that this cash grant support helps them to increase their earnings, increase their social participation. Conclusion: Participants with spinal cord injury had improve their economic and social life through this cash grant support. The following study result found that the cash grant support can be an effective support for the person with spinal cord injury for their financial empowerment. Key words: Spinal cord injury, microeconomic initiatives, Centre for Rehabilitation