My Occupational Therapy Blog

     Community mobility is an important aspect of an individual’s life. Today’s guest lecturer is a Certified Driver Rehabilitation Specialist and really opened my eyes to how occupational therapists can work with clients to regain their ability to navigate their community through driving. What stood out to me was the countless ways you can adapt a vehicle in order to make driving accessible. This includes adapting the gas pedals into hand controls or installing a lift in the back to easily load an electric scooter. Another aspect of his lecture that struck me was the clinical judgement skills an occupational therapist must develop to screen clients before moving to the driving assessment. You must be a skilled clinician to observe your client and ask questions that will serve as your guide to whether they are safe behind the wheel. You may assess their cognition including process skills, judgement, or memory to be impaired and deem it unsafe to continue...

      One thing that initially drew me to the field of occupational therapy is the holistic approach to patient care. I love how the practitioner considers the whole person and their needs to participate in the things they find most meaningful. Last week we had guest speaker lecture on the importance of nutrition for the aging adult population. One thing that stood out to me was the statistics presented about how many aging adults are living in poverty and as risk for being undernourishment. The speaker also lectured about the importance of nutrition for wound healing and overall recovery.      Occupational Therapy can support the work of nutritionists and help their clients in a variety of ways that promote nutritional intake. One such intervention includes working with clients to be independent with meal preparation. This could look like working  to improve their balance and strength for cooking tasks. You could also host a cooking class at a local ...

At the beginning of my occupational therapy master’s program, a professor instructed us to create a self-portrait of a leader by answering questions and following prompts to draw certain shapes and items based on our beliefs of leadership. Now, we are second years and the same professor instructed us to complete the activity one more and compare how our portraits have changed or stayed the same. Mine surprisingly came out to look almost exactly the same. My views of leadership and leaders in occupational therapy have relatively stayed the same based on the prompts. I still believe that leadership is a trait that can be both inborn and nurtured. Some are born with traits that make for great leaders and continue to grow them, while others work to develop the traits they are lacking. I also still believe that all occupational therapists are leaders. A therapist may not be a manager or an administrator, but he or she is daily guiding and leading patients towards their goals. Finally...