Launch of New Online Brain Injury Hub to Guide People Through Recovery

Synapse – Australia’s Brain Injury Organisation, has launched a new website which includes a comprehensive brain injury information hub.

The brain injury hub provides information for people who have a brain injury and carers, and has been designed to feature information at key times after injury.

“From the outset, we wanted the information hub to be evidence based and informed by people with lived experience, so we worked closely with people who have a brain injury, carers and our researchers to map out the different stages of recovery and the information that people need at each stage,” said Mr Schickerling.

The information included in the hub is featured within these stages which include, In the Hospital, Recovery and Rehab, Living with Brain Injury, and Information for Family and Carers.

“The hub is designed around real life experiences. We know that if someone’s in rehabilitation after a brain injury, they need very specific information that won’t be relevant to them when they’re in a different stage, such as adjusting to life at home,” said Mr Schickerling.

The insights gained from the co-design and research process were combined with Synapse existing specialist brain injury knowledge and the expertise of web developers to guide design and development.

“The website and hub design follows web accessibility guidelines and incorporates options such as adjusting the size and colour of the text and changing the website background. The accessible design also aims to simplify the navigation and layout, and make the site easy to use,” said Mr Schickerling.

Website users can bookmark pages to read later and can change the site’s language, and new web and communications technologies such as an online forum have been included, with live chat planned for deployment shortly after launch. Synapse plan on incorporating further information and resources over time.

“Feedback from people who have a brain injury emphasised the importance of having different formats available so information can be easily viewed, read or listened too. It’s already a comprehensive resource, but we’ll keep building more information and easy to access formats such as video into the site,” said Mr Schickerling.

The brain injury hub was funded by an Information, Linkages and Capacity Building (ILC) grant from the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS).

Synapse is asking people who have a brain injury, their carers and industry professionals to provide feedback about the hub and to be involved with the continuation of the development of online resources for people impacted by brain injury.

Opportunities to participate range from simple online surveys to community specific face-to-face group sessions. To sign up click here.