Falls are a complex problem. This makes preventing them a perfect target for our OT skillset. This week we are looking at an article that explores “the state of the science” on preventing falls in hospitalized patients. The authors walk us through: The scope of the problem The science (or lack thereof) supporting different interventions While many of the interventions sound simple (like gripper socks and alarms), the article we review in this 1-hour course reminds us that nothing is simple in cr...
Jan 02, 2023•1 hr 5 min
When we think of hand therapy , we tend to think of it as a practice area with an abundance of research. But, the mapping review of hand therapy interventions we examine this episode reminds us that there are also sizable gaps in the research—especially when it comes to more complex diagnoses. This means that when OTs are working with upper extremity conditions, we still need to pay careful attention to the other 2 pillars of evidence-based practice: the client values & developing our own sk...
Dec 12, 2022•59 min
As OTs, we believe that creating a therapeutic alliance is one of the most powerful vehicles to change. But, we also know that there are many barriers that exist to building transformational relationships with our clients Telehealth can feel like another such barrier—but it doesn’t have to be! The article we are looking at in this 1 hour podcast-based CE course is a qualitative study exploring the parent engagement and therapeutic alliance in teletherapy programs. The author’s intent was to begi...
Nov 27, 2022•1 hr 1 min
From pregnancy to age 2 is arguably the most important developmental window of our lifetimes. This makes the work of OTs who work with this age incredibly important. And, for the rest of us, we should be using our professional knowledge to advocate for the proper support for families at this critically important window. In this one hour podcast course, we are looking at a broad systematic review about OT motor inventions for children ages 0-5. The importance of this paper cuts across multiple pr...
Nov 14, 2022•1 hr 4 min
The use of sensory-based interventions (SBIs) and environmental modification are common OT treatments. But, what is the evidence behind these treatments? In this episode, we’ll look at an influential systematic review that explores that question. The authors lay out the evidence behind specific sensory techniques and environmental modifications for children with sensory integration (SI) differences. The authors explore and rate the levels of evidence of common treatments, like massage, weighted ...
Oct 31, 2022•57 min
Whether or not you are personally a fan of virtually reality—all OTs should be following the developing research on this technology. In this episode, we’ll discuss an article where the authors explore the use of virtual reality (VR) systems that are built specifically for rehab versus general-use VR, like the Nintendo Wii and Xbox. The authors really focus on the active ingredients that seem to make VR-based rehab effective. And, they put forth the principles of neurorehab that underlie successf...
Oct 17, 2022•1 hr 2 min
It is so easy to get caught in the minutiae of our daily work. And, sometimes it is incredibly helpful to zoom out and take a big picture look at the incredible changes we have seen in healthcare over the past decades. The journal article we are looking at this week gives us a bird’s-eye view of the past, present, and future of managing rheumatic and musculoskeletal (MSK) diseases. In the article you’ll find the same trends that we see in occupational therapy-specific research: a focus on self-m...
Oct 03, 2022•1 hr 5 min
We need some of our OTs with the biggest hearts and brightest minds to consider specializing in burn therapy. But, no matter what setting you work in, you will likely have someone with a burn patient on your caseload at some point. Burns are the 4th most common type of trauma worldwide (behind traffic accidents, falls, and interpersonal violence.) 90% of burns occur in low- to middle-income countries. While OTs have worked in burn units for decades, the research behind OT-specific contributions ...
Sep 18, 2022•57 min
Helping people change their habits to change their health is one of the main mechanisms that makes OT effective. But, I don’t think we spend enough time thinking about how HARD it is to change our habits. The article we are looking at today focuses on changing lifestyle habits for adults at high risk of a cardiovascular incident, like a stroke. The author’s aim is to conceptualize how engaging occupations can be used to facilitate health promoting habits. We’ll use this article as a jumping off ...
Sep 04, 2022•56 min
Constraint-induced Movement Therapy has the reputation for being an intervention that is only for specialized OTs in some far-away speciality clinic. But, trust me: no matter what population you work with, OTs should be following this research. Today, on the podcast we are looking at a Cochrane review of all the evidence that undergirds this treatment. CIMT is perhaps the most-studied OT intervention—and it has lessons to teach us all about: neuroplasticity, intensity, and the future of OT 🙂 Af...
Aug 21, 2022•57 min
The change from “caseload” to “workload” may not seem that dramatic, but make no mistake it is a quiet revolution that is happening in school-based OT. It fundamentally shifts how we deliver care. The article we are discussing on the podcast encourages a shifting away from an individualist, medical model “caseload” based approach. And, encourages us to embrace a “workload” approach, which hypothetically yields opportunities to focus more on population health. This shift has been underway for a w...
Aug 07, 2022•57 min
Many of us were not taught about the economics of OT in occupational therapy school. And, part of that reason is that the research base on the economic value of our work is just emerging. In this episode we will look at an article on the economic effects of OT in the acute and subacute setting. The good news in this article is that there is a growing amount of research about the economic value of OT—and the initial research is promising. The problem is that the existing research is widely varied...
Jul 18, 2022•55 min
The research we are reviewing in this course showcases how far we’ve come in the prevention, early detection, and treatment of cerebral palsy (CP) in children . The authors also explore the strength of the evidence behind 182 interventions for CP, organizing them into an “evidence traffic light.” This is an important paper for all OTs to read—not just because CP is one of the most common physical disabilities we see on our caseloads, but because the paper is so well written. The authors do a fan...
Jul 04, 2022•1 hr 4 min
The term cultural competence can feel too soft and narrow to really push our profession towards equity and justice. But, the article we are reviewing today from the top 100 OT-related articles , brings up several essential points for discussion. The mention of OT in the article is grim. The article highlights “culturally blind” attitudes of OTs that failed to change after cultural competence training. This is a stark reminder of the need for change—and the multi-layered work needed to make chang...
Jun 19, 2022•1 hr
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) weaves together multiple concepts that OTs are already familiar with and often use in practice. On a personal level, it provides helpful tools we can utilize as we navigate complex situations in our work. But, not only is it personally helpful, the research we’re looking at today shows us why we need to be aware of it as a therapy professional: Research supports the use of ACT in addressing chronic pain. In the research study we’ll explore in this podcast ...
Jun 06, 2022•1 hr 7 min
This prestigious guideline on Parkinson’s Disease (PD) treatment, that we’ll be covering in this podcast episode, recommends that rehab therapies are started at the time of diagnosis and continued throughout the disease course. This article will update you on key information about the PD disease process, the pervasiveness of non-motor symptoms, and the effectiveness of different treatments. The knowledge we are gaining about PD should definitely be impacting your sessions. (Hint: please be talki...
May 16, 2022•1 hr 2 min
How we understand our role as occupational therapy practitioners makes a huge difference in how we show up for our clients. But, unfortunately, some theories of OT practice fail to aid us in practical clinical reasoning that focuses on occupation. Luckily, the theories of OT practice that are emerging are getting closer to capturing the care we aspire to deliver—and provide more useful frameworks to guide our clinical reasoning. Today we will dive into the CORE Approach. The approach is a mechan...
May 01, 2022•1 hr
Our spinal cord injury clients stay in our hearts and minds. After all, we help them and their families navigate tremendous life changes. This week’s article gives us a solid big-picture review of what we know (and don’t know) about spinal cord injury rehab. You’ll learn about commonly used assessments, as well as which treatments are gaining traction (and which ones aren’t.) And, most importantly, this article serves as a good reminder that there are simply no magical, straightforward answers i...
Apr 18, 2022•59 min
In this 1 hour course, we will be diving into an incredibly helpful journal article that summarizes the evidence behind pediatric OT interventions . The authors take 52 pediatric OT interventions for children with disabilities and rate the evidence behind them. They organize the evidence into a traffic light infographic—where green means “the evidence supports this intervention.” This alone makes the evidence ratings super easy to scan and more accessible for therapists (and families and policy ...
Apr 04, 2022•1 hr 1 min
Spending time in research can deliver the humbling, but needed, reminder that not all therapy leads to clear value for our clients. For example, in the United States, we can now see that in the 2010s therapy was being delivered in skilled nursing facilities (SNFs)—beyond what was helpful for clients. Part of the problem was the fee-for-service payment model that incentivized skilled nursing facilities to deliver high quantities of therapy minutes to as many patients as possible. (More therapy eq...
Mar 20, 2022•1 hr 1 min
It can feel like everyone is discussing the benefits of mindfulness. Yet, with all this fanfare, we must ask: does the evidence justify incorporating mindfulness into occupational therapy? The systematic review we will look at in this one hour course says, “YES!” (At least for specific chronic pain conditions.) The authors provide a great overview of the problem of pain—and they also discuss various mindfulness-based interventions for chronic pain, including the research behind them. After we re...
Mar 07, 2022•58 min
Research is backing up what many of us are experiencing in our communities: the pandemic is exacerbating mental health issues. And, one can imagine how this would be true for new mothers—so many families’ birth experiences have been drastically impacted by COVID protocols, followed by increased isolation once the family arrives home. The article we will be discussing in this one-hour podcast course is a call to action to support the positive mental health of new mothers, particularly during this...
Jan 27, 2022•1 hr
In this one hour episode of the OT Potential podcast, you will be introduced to the Kawa model and how it can be used to foster collaboration for a rehab team. The Kawa Model uses the metaphor of a river to depict one’s life journey. In this mental model, occupational therapists enable, restore, and/or maximize their client’s life flow. The model can be used with individual clients and groups. And, we’ll begin our episode by looking at research that explores how an acute care therapy team used t...
Jan 24, 2022•1 hr 9 min
What is the future of OT? How will your own OT career look over the next decade? How will our profession change and evolve? The journal article we explore in this podcast is very concise, but it certainly packs a punch. It lays out a vision set by the American Occupational Therapy Association for where they would like to see the occupational therapy profession by 2025. We’ll kick off the podcast by reviewing the article. Then, we’re thrilled to have Arameh Anvarizadeh, Vice President of the AOTA...
Jan 09, 2022•1 hr 5 min
If you haven’t been following the exciting research behind the CO-OP Approach™, this episode is for you. CO-OP stands for Cognitive Orientation to (Daily) Occupational Performance. This is a trademarked approach with a formal certification program, so we won’t be teaching the actual method. However, we’ll be discussing the research behind the CO-OP Approach™ , as well as some ways it can impact your practice. We’ll explore the primary research article, where the CO-OP Approach™ is performed by O...
Dec 10, 2021•59 min
The research we explore in this podcast calls pelvic floor dysfunction a significant and neglected public health issue. The authors share a discouraging statistic: despite pelvic floor dysfunction impacting around 25% of women in the US, there is a profound lack of understanding of the disorder and how to treat it. The good news is that OTs are perfectly poised to help meet the needs of pelvic health patients! We’ll use our primary research article to jumpstart our understanding of pelvic floor ...
Dec 07, 2021•1 hr
The research we discuss on the OT Potential Podcast has a recurring theme: therapy goals should always support what is meaningful to the client. But, lurking behind this best practice is an important question: what do we do when a patient is not of sound mind? We’ll explore an article that hits the question head on, looking at client-centered care for patients with psychosis. It’s an especially helpful read for mental health OTs—but we can all learn something from it, since every clinician sees ...
Nov 22, 2021•1 hr 7 min
We’ve had compelling evidence for a while now about the benefits of providing acute care hospital services from the comfort of a patient’s home. (This model is widely known as “hospital in the home.”) But, for us in the US, it has been hard to imagine how our complex medical system would ever change to accommodate such a fundamental shift in healthcare delivery. Enter: the pandemic. Now, our whole society is looking at the inadequacies of limiting acute care to the number of beds available in a ...
Nov 08, 2021•1 hr 4 min
We became occupational therapy practitioners to deliver transformative care to our clients. This is a tall order to begin with—and we also hold justice as one of our core values. So, we want to transform lives AND do so in a socially responsible way. This is hard and complex work. It requires that we question and move beyond overly simplistic theories of practice. The article we explore in this one-hour podcast pushes us to see beyond the concept of “individualism.” After all, limiting our lens ...
Oct 24, 2021•1 hr
The research is clear—adults living with cancer have significant unmet therapy needs. But how can we, as occupational therapy professionals, best serve this population? It’s a great question, and one we’ll explore in-depth on this one-hour episode of the OT Potential Podcast! First, we’ll dig into the research around disability in activities of daily living among adults with cancer. Next, we’ll be joined by Vanessa Monique Yanez, MSOT, OTR/L. Vanessa will lend her expertise to our discussion of ...
Oct 11, 2021•1 hr 7 min
