social value; occupational therapy

Jessica says this is a very interesting article about professional changes in occupational therapy. I think its because it speaks to our interest in social value (particularly for rural places) rather than “transformational growth”. It tells us:

It’s a strange time to train as an occupational therapist, a profession that historically has been unrecognised, overlooked or plain misunderstood. The job’s evolving nature plays a big part in this. Whereas occupational therapy (OT) was once seen as a useful way to occupy soldiers disabled in war, or inmates of lunatic asylums with basket weaving, it is now being taken seriously for its ability to support people to achieve what they really want in life.

Even as a student new to the profession, I can see the changes as OT pushes the boundaries and moves into new areas. This shift is not just happening within OT; marks of it can be seen across healthcare, for example with prescribing physiotherapists, and speech and language therapists working on youth offender programmes. Add in the overall context of large-scale changes in the social care system and it’s scarcely possible to predict what’s in store in a couple of months, let alone in the next few years. This makes it an interesting time for trainees like me.