Occupational therapy roles and responsibilities: Evidence from a pilot study of time use in an integrated health and social care trust

Introduction In response to growing demands on health and social care services there is an emphasis on communities addressing the needs of local populations to improve lives and reduce inequalities. Occupational therapists are responding to these demands by expanding their scope of practice into innovative settings, such as working with refugees, the homeless and residents of nursing homes, and within sport and leisure environments. The benefits of sport are widely acknowledged, and this paper argues that occupational therapists could play a pivotal role in enabling people to participate. Method This qualitative study drew on a phenomenological approach and used interviews and thematic analysis to explore five occupational therapists’ experiences of enabling people to participate in sport. Findings Findings revealed that participants demonstrated the uniqueness of occupational therapy when enabling people to participate in sport and practised according to their professional philosophy. There were opportunities to reach wider communities and promote the value of occupational therapy by collaborating with organisations, but there were also challenges when working outside of traditional settings. Conclusion The study emphasises the unique skills occupational therapists can bring to this setting. It highlights opportunities to expand their practice, to forge new partnerships in sports and leisure environments, and to address the national inactivity crisis.

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The Return Home Program: integrated health and social care for post-stroke patients

International Journal of Integrated Care ◽

10.5334/ijic.3029 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 16 (6) ◽

pp. 219

Author(s):

Aina Plaza ◽

Marta Fabà ◽

Marco Inzitari ◽

Mercè Salvat ◽

Patricio Hernández ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Social Care ◽

Stroke Patients ◽

Home Program ◽

Post Stroke ◽

Health And Social Care ◽

Integrated Health ◽

Return Home

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Impact of occupational therapy in an integrated adult social care service: Audit of Therapy Outcome Measure Findings

Journal of Integrated Care ◽

10.1108/jica-04-2021-0020 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽

Author(s):

Sharon J. Davenport

Keyword(s):

Occupational Therapy ◽

Social Care ◽

Outcome Measure ◽

Care Service ◽

Data Gathering ◽

Sampling Bias ◽

Therapy Outcome ◽

Social Care Service ◽

Content Type ◽

Health And Social Care

PurposeHealth and social care services should demonstrate the quality of their interventions for commissioners, patients and carers, plus it is a requirement for occupational therapists to measure and record outcomes. Use of the “Therapy Outcome Measure” (TOMs) standardised tool was implemented by an occupational therapy adult social care service to demonstrate outcomes from April 2020, following integration to a community NHS Trust.Design/methodology/approachThe aim was to demonstrate occupational therapy outcomes in adult social care through a local audit of the TOMs. The objective was to determine if clients improved following occupational therapy intervention in the four domains of impairment, activity, participation and wellbeing/carer wellbeing. 70 cases were purposively sampled over a 2-month timeframe, extracting data from the local electronic recording system.FindingsOccupational therapy in adult social care clearly makes an impact with their client group and carers. Evidence from the dataset demonstrates clinically significant change, as 93% of clients seen by adult social care occupational therapy staff showed an improvement in at least one TOMs domain during their whole episode of care. 79% of activity scores, 20% of participation scores and 50% of wellbeing scores improved following intervention. 79% of carer wellbeing scores improved following occupational therapy.Research limitations/implicationsThe audit did not collect data on uptake from the separate teams (equipment, housing, STAR and adult social care work) in occupational therapy adult social care. Potential sampling bias occurred as cases with completed scores only were purposively sampled. Sampling was not random which prevented data gathering on uptake of TOMs across the separate teams. Additionally, the audit results can only be applied to the setting from which the data was collected, so has limited external validity.Originality/valueThese novel findings illustrate the valuable and unique impact of occupational therapy in this adult social care setting. The integration of adult social care into an NHS Community Trust has supported the service to measure outcomes, by utilising the same standardised tool in use by allied health professions across the Trust.

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