Empowerment of personal injury victims
Amsterdam Interdisciplinary Centre for Law and Health
Nieke Elbers, M.Sc.
Empowerment of personal injury victims
Empowerment of personal injury victims
Outline
1. Introduction
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Secondary victimisation
Procedural justice
2. Intervention
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E-health website
3. Method
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Empirical research
Effect on well-being?
4. Conclusion
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Planning
Relevance
Empowerment of personal injury victims
1. Introduction
Current claims settlement:
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Negative impact on victims’ psychological and physical recovery
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Focusing on monetary damage
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Immaterial needs are not taken into account
Empowerment of personal injury victims
1. Introduction
Victims experience:
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Lack of information
Lack of involvement
Lack of ‘voice’
Lack of trust
Lack of communication
Conclusion: Secondary victimization
i.e. Renewed victimization caused by process of claims settlement
Empowerment of personal injury victims
1. Introduction
Procedural justice:
Procedural aspects more important than outcome
Information
Explanation
Voice
Respect
Politeness
Fairness
Well-being
Empowerment of personal injury victims
2. Intervention
Interactive website (e-health):
1) Information
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Claims settlement
Representative
Opposite party
Social security
Conflict
2) E-coach
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Problem solving
5 weekly lessons
Reading, examples, assignments
Feedback
Empowerment of personal injury victims
2. Intervention
Other e-coach websites:
• Mental health, e.g. depression, anxiety
• Empirically tested: 80% feels better
• Physical health, e.g. MS, cancer
• New: Personal injury
Translation: ‘Grip op my case’
Empowerment of personal injury victims
2. Intervention
Potential target group:
Mark
Susan
Philip
• 25 years old
• Construction worker
• Back and hip injury
• 41 years old
• Secretary
• Whiplash injury
• 53 years old
• Software engineer
• Leg fracture
Problems:
• Compensation settlement
• Injury
Problems:
• Medically: Not taken seriously
• Financial insecurity
Problems:
• Liability: Self blame
• Accident trauma
Empowerment of personal injury victims
2. Intervention
E-coach:
1. Determine problems
 distinguish solvable, unimportant, unsolvable
2. Tackle solvable problems
 step-by-step plan, communication techniques
3. Tackle unimportant problems
 thinking errors
4. Tackle unsolvable problems
 stages of grief, promoting acceptance
5. Make future plan
 to achieve important things in life
Empowerment of personal injury victims
3. Method
Validation website:
• Interviews
• Need assessment, examples, cases
• Focus group (expert meeting)
• Information module: simple, clear, neutral
• E-coach module: supporting
• Pilot
• User friendliness, comprehensibility
Empowerment of personal injury victims
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3. Method
Intervention group
Baseline
Baseline
3 months
6 months
12 months
personal injury victims
Demographics Case
details Severity of injury
Empowerment
Justice
Wellbeing
Stress
Costs
Knowledge
compare
Control group
Empowerment of personal injury victims
4. Conclusion
• Results of study in 2011
• Insight in secondary victimization en procedural justice
• Improving wellbeing of personal injury victims
• Implementation website in 2012
• First e-health intervention in legal practice
Empowerment of personal injury victims
Thank you
Contact information:
Nieke Elbers
n.elbers@law.vu.nl