Occupational Therapy

Occupational Therapy aims to enable people to maximise their independence in productivity, self care and leisure through occupation.  It focuses on treatment following a process of assessment, goal planning, intervention and reviewing.

Assessment Process:

The focus is on identifying individuals strengths and difficulties.  From this I look at how these factors effect individuals ability to engage in occupations that are meaningful and purposeful to them.

Areas covered within an Occupational Therapy Assessment:

  • Understanding premorbid functioning  – education, work, lifestyle choices
  • Motivation to engage in occupation
  • Historical and current patterns of occupation
  • Process Skills—the management and modification of skills
  • Communication and Interaction
  • Motor Skills—how individuals move to interact with their environment
  • Environment—how this impacts on occupational engagement
  • Risk in relation to  occupational functioning

Intervention:

Focuses on skill maintenance and / or development in areas identified from the assessment.

Occupational Therapy intervention involves both practical  and talking therapy.  For intervention to be effective and skill  development to be sustained Occupational Therapists focus on activity analysis—this involved breaking down an activity to fully understand what aspects of it an individual is struggling with.  I then plan intervention to develop the specific skills the individual finds challenging, grading the over all activity, focusing on achievable goals in small steps, with the overall end goal always in mind.

Areas of Intervention:

  • Personal Activities of Daily Living e.g. self care, appearance
  • Domestic Activities of Daily Living e.g. cooking, budgeting, cleaning
  • Community access e.g. Road Safety, accessing public transport, orientation,
  • Cognitive work e.g. Memory, routine, problem solving
  • Sensory Processing—emotional regulation through sensory work
  • Identity –  promoting sense of self, self worth, purpose, roles
  • Confidence
  • Assessment and recommendations re accommodation including type and level of support required.
  • Community engagement—leisure activities/ education
  • Work Skills

Assessment and Outcomes measures used:

  • Model of Human Occupation
    • Addresses how and why we engage in occupational behaviour using different assessment tools
  • Model of Creative Ability
    • Assesses occupational identity and his/her current level of ability using the creative participation measure
  • AMPS ( Assessment of motor and process skills)
    • Measures how well a client  performs familiar activities of daily living (ADL) in terms of in creased physical effort, decreased efficiency, safety, and independence
  • ESI (Evaluation of Social Interaction)
    • Measures a client’s quality of social interaction
  • Sensory Profile
    • Trait measure of sensory processing patterns and effects on functional performance