What is that?...The response I most often get when I tell people I'm an occupational therapist. I love my job but it is hard to describe what I do! There are many different settings where occupational therapists can work and each one is so different. I was doing some research for a work project (we are coming up on April - OT Month) and found this great video and description! Perhaps I should just direct people to this :)
Description from MamaOT
Occupational therapy (a.k.a. OT) is a holistic profession that helps people across the lifespan participate in the things they want and need to do through the therapeutic use of everyday activities, also known as “occupations”.* We use these occupations as both the intervention and outcome of therapy. Hence the name “occupational therapy”.
When it comes to pediatrics, this means we OTs are really good at providing intervention by engaging kids in their primary childhood occupation — PLAY! But pediatric occupational therapists don’t “just” play. We provide individualized therapeutic intervention to help kids improve their performance in occupations such as eating, sleeping, self-care, and learning by addressing underlying difficulties like fine motor, problem solving, attention, and sensory processing skills (to name a few). We also take into account the effect of a task’s difficulty on the child’s performance, as well as the role of the physical and social environment.
We are creative, scientific, and evidence-based. We are masters of modification and expert task analyzers. We love what we do and are passionate about making a positive difference in the lives of children, their families, and their communities.
