Factors influencing Prevention and Early Intervention within the Disability Claims Management Process in South Africa

Abstract

Introduction: The disability claims management process may be broken up into four stages: prevention, early intervention, rehabilitation and return to work. There are various stakeholders involved in the process and various factors that influence the process. Currently, there is a lack of literature that creates insight into the prevention and early intervention stages.

Method: An explorative qualitative study was conducted with 26 purposively sampled stakeholders from the disability insurance sector. Qualitative data from virtual individual semi-structured interviews were inductively thematically analysed, using NVIVO Pro 12, to establish emergent themes.

Results: Four inhibiting and four facilitating factors emerged from the data analysis. Inhibitors included: psycho-social-economic hardship, group insurer inhibitors, disability stigma and deconditioning and poor health and disability understanding. Facilitators included: group insurer facilitators, a remain-at-work (RAW) approach, medical and vocational management, and social and occupational support. The overarching theme emphasised disability as a complex phenomenon influenced by various medical and non-medical factors.

Conclusions: The complexity of a disability contributes to the disability claims management process lacking focus on prevention and early intervention. Despite this complexity, retaining an employee at work while receiving early intervention emerged as a meaningful approach to decreasing the likelihood of the employee's ill health progressing to long-term disability.

 

Key words: disability management, vocational management, disability income replacement insurance