My OT journey

The OTPF is a document that is used by OT practitioners as a guide to the constructs within OT. For example, it talks about the different types of occupations a client may have and puts them into categories so it is easier to understand and find. It is important to learn about it because it's an effective tool to help therapists use a holistic approach with their clients. It is also the same across the board (for example, every state and country uses the OTPF) which makes it easier for therapists to communicate as it is a common "language" in OT.

A current role in my life is being a roommate to Maddy. An occupation that goes with being a roommate would be doing my part in cleaning the apartment, even though sometimes I don't want to clean. An activity with the occupation would be doing the dishes after cooking and eating and the task associated with the occupation would be turning on the water to effectively rinse off the dishes.

Over time, occupational therapy has always been about helping people return to performing their meaningful occupations independently. Even through the reductionist phase the therapists focused on rehabilitating and integrating the soldiers back into society returning from the war. In today's lecture we talked about the domains of occupational therapy and about how one of the roles of an OT is to have, "knowledge and expertise of everyday life activities that people find meaningful and purposeful". This is an example of how occupational therapy has always been about helping people get back to performing  meaningful occupations  throughout the last 100 years. I love how it hasn't changed even through the different "phases" of OT!