Behavioral Trial Studying Programmed Training to Improve Advocacy Skills for Individuals With Traumatic Brain Injury

The Midwest Advocacy Project (MAP) is a community-based multiple-site randomized practical behavioral trial of advocacy skill training for individuals with traumatic brain injury (TBI), their families, and significant others. The purpose is to evaluate the efficacy of a 4-session advocacy training program to improve behavioral advocacy skills compared to self-directed advocacy training of the same session frequency. Groups will be randomly assigned to either a programmed group or a self-directed group in collaboration with the Brain Injury Associations of Minnesota, Iowa, and Wisconsin each year over the 5 year study period. The primary outcome is pre-post measures of written and verbal advocacy skill measured by the Advocacy Behavior Rating Scale. It is hypothesized that subjects who receive programmed advocacy training will show greater positive change on pre-post measures of advocacy skill measures than subjects receiving self-directed training.