Getting back into gear.....

I've been a bit absent from my usual web life for the past couple of weeks. Sadly my beautiful Mum has been diagnosed with breast cancer. She's going through some surgery at the moment and hoping to start chemo in the next few weeks. Being on patient and family side of the healthcare equation for a change is not really where we wanted to be but I suppose its just a case on putting one foot in front of the other for now.....

Anyway life plods on and I have some new and exciting things happening.....

I'm really looking forward to doing a session on the MSc in Assistive Technology course at Coventry university in a couple of weeks. I'm talking to the students about assessment in my area of practice and what I'm hoping they will get out of it is the importance of all the contextual factors beyond the client themselves. By that I mean the ability of the persons environment (social and physical) to support their needs, and the influence of cultural aspects. Anyway this is a very brief post and I will write more after the session and maybe post the powerpoint.

Last week I was down at UK OT HQ aka COT/BAOT offices in London. I was recently appointed to one of the professional practice seats on the Membership and External Affairs board. I've been a member of BAOT for 12 years but never really taken an active role. Following the Disability Forum networking day I attended last year I really felt motivated to get involved, so after a gentle (and much appreciated!) shove from a OT colleague I applied for the role.

I had a really interesting day learning more about the board and the work of the OTN, BJOT and the website progress. It was good to be able to comment on the excellent projects underway. I was excited to be able to offer some opinions on how the organisation could make the most of media such as blogs, twitter and facebook to promote OT and membership. I was really pleased that people were very positive about my intention to use these channels to relate my experience as a new board member. As you might have guessed I think it will be so important to BAOT to use these tools to help current and potential OTs feel connected to their professional colleagues and their professional organisation.

Are there any BAOT members out there reading the blog? Leave a comment or tweet me to let me know your thoughts about how web2.0 could help you connect.

Occupational Blog Carnival #2 - Call for submissions

This months the carnival is hosted by Bronnie Thompson over at Health Skills Weblog

The topic is ‘clinical reasoning and occupational therapy’

The closing date for posts is the 3rd April so get going now!
The carnival will be published on the 6th April.

Click here to submit a post

Don't for get to subscribe to the carnival visit its permanent home here.

Please publicize the carnival on your own blog or through other channels such as Twitter, Facebook etc.

Blogging as a voice for the therapists "gut"

This post reflects my thought process following the hotly debated thread on the use of models on the Salford Road blog.

I was rambling on to my husband about how exciting it is to be engaged in a debate about OT with some of the most prominent and influential therapists in the world through web based media. I'll be honest with you - it can be a bit intimidating! This in turn got me thinking about some of the barriers that people have to blogging or engaging in these type of debates. Some of this anxiety may be related to a lack of confidence about articulating ones opinion in such a public way. Making your professional thoughts and opinions known on the web constitutes a type of risk taking in opening you up to critique and comment.

Practicing therapists often feel a gulf between critically appraised, peer review research or theoretical tomes. I then started thinking about how this online debate compares to writing or reading an article in a journal concluded that blogging and online debate offers such an exciting voice for the anecdotal, experimental "gut" professional opinion of practitioners. It provides such a responsive and engaging way to capture and communicate these types of thoughts and opinions.

So for me the internet offers a potential solution to the transmission of that knowledge which falls between practice and research.

As I tetter on the deg of confirming my MSc funding I feel these posts have been a "spa for the mind" and have both refreshed and really inspired me. This reflection galvanizes me in promoting the benefits of web based communication for therapists!

Let me know what you think!

Occupational Therapy Blog Carnival Edition #1!

Welcome to the March 9, 2009 edition of occupational therapy. This is the inaugural edition so it's very exciting! Thanks so much to the contributors and those people who have offered to host upcoming editions.

I was a bit worried about not specifying a topic for this first edition but I didn't want to scare people off submitting a post. I'm really pleased to say that we have a great series of posts which capture the exciting range and diversity of the profession.

Theory

Angela Hook presents Core Values or Core Skills ?........... You decide posted at Salford University Occupational Therapy Education Blog. Not only was it a fascinating post tackling a central issue for OTs, but created lots of discussion, both on the blog and on Facebook. Defining what we do, our skills and beliefs has always been one of the great challenges for our profession. On Twitter @HeatherOT and I wondered about asking OT twitters to define OT in a tweetable 140 characters. Heather came up with

"PTs will teach you to walk, OTs will teach you to dance. We focus on higher level functioning to be able to perform all ADL"

Building on this theme Adiemusfree (Bronnie Thompson) presented Talking about roles in pain management posted at HealthSkills Weblog, saying, "Thanks for starting this carnival!" Bronnie highlights the importance of balancing core skills with the ability to share skills as part of a cohesive team. Interdependence, as opposed to independence as a strength in a team approach.

Frontiers of practice
Andy Levy presents The best book I never read posted at Gosh, that's neat! which he describes as "A pseudo-review of Occupational Therapy Without Borders: Learning from the Spirit of Survivors" The book he describes is written by Frank Kronenburg, the daddy of looking outside the OT box. As Andy underlines, his inspirational view of OT serves as a call for all OTs to "go forth and occupy"!


Alece Kaplan is someone who seems to have taken Frank's advice and writes for the OT Advocacy blog. She presents the Death With Dignity Act Implemented on March 4th All OTs working with people facing terminally illness should be aware of the legal and political drivers in their country of practice, as well as their own feelings, prejudices and anxieties around the complex area of suicide/euthanasia.

Alvaro Fernandez presents Centre for Brain Fitness at Baycrest: Interview with Dr. William Reichman posted at SharpBrains: Your Window into the Brain Fitness Revolution, saying, "we have an opportunity to make major progress in Brain Health in the XXI century, similar to what happened with Cardiovascular Health in the XX, and technology will play a crucial role". OTs are have excellent skills in using technology to meet our clients goals and we should consider the expanding role we may be able to play in the area of "brain fitness". OTs are already engaging well with the concept of Wiihabilitation and the benefits it can play in a range of practice areas.



Learning in Practice

Margaret Rice presents 10 Things They Don't Teach You In School - Learning on the job as a school based therapist posted at Your Therapy Source. Although Margaret has a background in Physical Therapy her practical advise is great for all therapists and therapy students starting work in an educational setting.

And another thing......

I thought it might be good to also feature a news article related to OT which caught my eye. Take a look at this dutch study which showed the effectiveness of OT interventions for people with Alzheimers.

"The Dutch folks found, first, the OT treatment program was considered a substantial success about one-third of the time. Next, they found the average cost of care of the group that had the OT program was about $2,600 less than the regular treatment group."

I think that OT's (in the UK at least!) often worry a lot about marketing and evidencing their service. This encouraging research demonstrates that good quality therapy can also be cost effective. We shouldn't be afraid to "describe by the dollar", in fact we must to ensure the future of OT in an increasingly financially pressured world.

That concludes this edition. Submit your blog article to the next edition of occupational therapy using our carnival submission form. Past posts and future hosts can be found on our blog carnival index page.

The next edition of the carnival will be hosted by Bronnie Thompson at the Healthskills Weblog.
The closing date for submission is 3rd April and the carnival will be published on 6th April.

Subscribe to the carnival at it's permanent home here

Technorati tags:
occupational therapy, blog carnival.

Is there anybody out there? Talking into the wind

Blogging is great but I sometimes wonder - is anyone actually reading this stuff or finding it interesting? I know trying to get people to comment on your blog is a common affliction for bloggers, and that the web is smothered with lurkers.

Having a blog about OT means that my blog might not get as much traffic as others on say celebrity gossip but hopefully the posts get read by people who have a real interest the the things I blog about.

It almost feels like talking into the wind.................. That said talking into the wind can be quite cathartic and useful in itself. Worst care scenario it's a great tool for reflection and getting some thoughts down.

So I'm going to try a different tactic and propose this as a delurking post. Maybe thats a bit mad because if no-one comments I'm going to feel a bit silly but oh well sometimes you've just to put yourself out there. So go on lurkers (lets hope there are some) dip your toe in the blogging water and say hi!

An Occupational Therapy Carnival?

I keep hearing this term being bandied about and I had no clue what it was so turned to wikipedia for a definition. This seems like it might be a great way to link together the OT bloggers and get some publicity in some hard copy publications and increase the awareness of the great ideas and expertise sharing that is happening through our blogs?

I would be interested to hear your thoughts!

For your own safety

I wouldn't search for posts on health care professionals or OTs on here..........

Backtype

In the interest of improving my blog and blogging skills I am trying to comment more on other blogs. Problem is I have a toddler and a full time job so my brain aint what it used to be and I'm having trouble keeping track of what I said where!

In order to address this challenge I've been taking a look at Backtype. I've sorted the link to the blog and now seem to have it posting my comments in OK. Any thoughts? Anyone use this?

Blogging and the day job

Heres a question for you all. If you have/start a blog which will be talking about your experiences as a professional should you inform your employer? I've done quite a lot of reading about confidentiality and professionals blogs and the general guidance seems to be a healthy dose of common sense.

I have a "disclaimer" in my "about me" section which attempts to clarify that I am blogging my own views, not those of my employer of my profession. Is that helpful or does it detract from the posts?

I was discussing the joys of blogging with a friend who informed me that the organisation he works for asks that its employees do not blog at all about their work irrespective of the level to which they anonymise it. Is that right? Apparently its so prospective employees, clients and the general public don't read anything negative about the organisation. Seems to be more than a little contrary to the concept of free speech!

For more thoughts on blogging and confidentiality in general take a look at these two posts from top blog Sarah's Musings, firstly "Getting our knickers in a twist" and "An ethics question"

Any thoughts?

Why blog?

So I'm broaching the idea of our service having a blog an I'm sure I will have to sell it so I had a look at why other people might think its a good, or bad, idea and found this interesting post.