Occupational Therapy Good Morning, My

Occupational Therapy

Good morning, my speech today embraces the topic of OCCUPATIONAL THERAPY. Many of you may correlate occupational therapy with work-related injuries, and that is accurate, but it is incomplete. The actual definition of occupational therapy, according to the American Occupational Therapy Association, is as follows:

Occupational therapy is skilled treatment that helps individuals achieve independence in all facets of their lives." Basically, the association is saying that occupational therapy helps people from all walks of life develop the skills needed for the "job of living" - and that includes those who have sustained injuries at work, those with chronic health conditions like multiple sclerosis, arthritis and vision problems, and individuals with "mental health or behavioral problems like Alzheimer's and post-traumatic stress.

Occupational therapy is of course an absolute necessity for people who have suffered a stroke, or sustained serious burns, amputations or spinal cord injuries, according to the American Occupational Therapy Association. If you know someone who has had a stroke, you know that their speech may have been seriously impaired, and the practical way for them to learn to communicate effectively again is through occupational speech therapy.

Another approach to occupational therapy is presented in the book, Occupational Therapy and Activities Health: Toward Health Through Activities, by Simme Cynkin and Anne Mazur Robinson. The authors point out in Chapter 1 that "...activities are the distinctive hallmark of occupational therapy." Indeed, individuals who suffer from mental and/or physical dysfunction, the authors assert, can reverse that dysfunction "through engagement activities." Those activities depend, of course, on the nature of the physical and mental problems; but essentially activities are prescribed by professionals based on the "overall feeling of comfort... appropriateness [and] satisfaction" that the individual achieves. They may be as simple as knitting and basket weaving, or as strenuous as lifting weights and walking on a treadmill. The successful outcome of these occupational therapy activities depends largely upon the commitment of the individual to get healthy, the authors assert.

In the book Ergonomics for Therapists, author Karen Jacobs explains that the need for occupational therapy is greatly reduced when the design of the equipment people use at work and at home is ergonomically appropriate. In other words, ergonomics focuses on humans "and their interactions with the environment," Jacobs writes on page 10. Preventative occupational therapy is fully appropriate when the "physical, cognitive, and psychological characteristics of humans" does not blend seamlessly with the equipment and tools that humans work with, Jacobs writes.

What are the main emerging physical issues that occupational therapists face? In the July-August-September 2004 edition of the Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine, the authors emphasize that in the near future, occupational therapists "will be treating an increasing number of clients with visual impairment." This is due to the fact that more and more adults are choosing to work until the age of 70, in order to make ends meet and pay off home mortgages. Older people may still have good use of their hands and be alert in their minds, but human eyesight inevitably fades with the passing of time.

In conclusion, it is also important to understand that other issues that negatively interfere with good healthy living - like cigarette smoking, eating disorders, stress and alcohol abuse - can be alleviated with creative approaches to occupational therapy. Indeed, according to the book, Walking Medicine: The Lifetime Guide to Preventative & Therapeutic Exercise Walking Programs, occupational therapy isn't always complicated or expensive.