Background

People with severe mental illness (SMI) can enhance their occupational outcomes by engaging with a comprehensive support team, which might include both cognitive and vocational support. To date, there have been no reports of the personal experience of individuals undertaking such interventions.

Aims

This study aimed to explore the subjective experience of participating in cognitive remediation (CR), as an adjunctive treatment to illness-self management psycho-education for jobseekers (HOPE).

Methods

Thirteen jobseekers with SMI, who had completed a CR program of 20 hours duration, in addition to a 20 hours of the HOPE program, responded to an individual semi-structured interview concerning their experience of the program. Data were analysed using content analysis.

Results

Feedback was predominantly positive. Participants described CR as a beneficial experience in improving their intrinsic (e.g. self-efficacy, motivation), cognitive and social functioning. It also revealed aspects to be addressed.

Conclusions

This study highlights the positive potential of this type of intervention, but also reveals the barriers that people with SMI may confront including the lack of CR availability and vocational/personal support. It is hoped that this study will assist in generating evidence on effective ways to improve the current CR approach.

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