I guess I already pinpointed three topic areas within my subject that I’m interested in writing about this semester. One topic area that I’m interested in writing about is what occupational therapists do to strengthen a person’s proprioceptive and vestibular system. This topic is interesting to me because I work at a school for disabled children, usually with students who have severe autism. I attend some of their OT appointments at school and get the pleasure of learning how OTs work with different disabilities. However, I really am not aware of what the therapists do to strengthen these systems or how they determine the child’s limitations because of their disabilities. My connection to the subject is that fact that my mother is a special education teacher who works with higher functioning students, yet she also deals with student’s limitations due to their proprioceptive and vestibular systems.
This is another reason why I would like to learn more about the role of occupational therapists in a school setting. As a teacher, my mother has OTs come in to the school to do some assessing of certain, individual students. However, because she teaches at a private school, OTs from the outside community must come to her because there are no therapists on staff at the private school. For this reason, I am interested in finding out what specific schools need to do in order to have an occupational therapist on staff as well as what the therapists do once they are on staff in the school setting.
The third and final area that interests me is the role of occupational therapists in mental rehab facilities. This interests me because their work is so different in these types of facility and I am really unsure of exactly what kind of therapy they provide to patients receiving psychiatric care. My connection to this area is that I know many people who have struggled with mental issues like depression and anxiety disorders and I would like to know what kind of things OTs do to assist these people and develop treatment plans for them.
Since we spoke in class, this post seems redundant. I do like your preliminary ideas for the research project. Occupational therapists along with physical therapists will be the go-to place in the near future for people with certain medical conditions. Doctors won't be as necessary if prescriptions aren't required for therapists to treat us.
ReplyDeleteBTW, thanks for the definitions :)