Hi Mike: In the mental health facility where I work OTs and Rehab Counsellors (they are called Vocational Counsellors here) do work together. And there are certainly some turf issues, but it is nothing very complicated or deep rooted. It is difficult for me to comment on how similar OT and Rehab Counselling are in theoretical terms. However, OT focuses on more than vocational rehab in its emphasis on the all-encompassing idea of occupation. As well based on my experience and the experience of some of my OT colleagues our emphasis on the use of standardized vocational assessments and educational assessments may likely make the modalities OTs use somewhat different from the assessment modalities that Rehab or Vocational Counsellors use. However, in terms of vocational goal setting with clients there are certainly some significant similarities.
My sense of the vocational rehab role for OTs is that it is a very much neglected aspect of their role. In fact I would even go so far as to say that there are probably a handful of OTs out there who even perceive vocational rehab as being a part of the OT role. In my opinion this neglect is unfortunate. However, it is also likely that in part this may be because OTs may have a hazy idea of what exactly vocational assessment and rehab consist. I was fortunate enough to have worked closely with the OT Discipline Lead at my facility, and she happened to be very clear on the vocational rehab role in OT and has been an amazing resource person in this context. This led me to develop a very different perspective of the OT role in vocational rehab. In fact I believe that OTs can make a critical and qualitative contribution to vocational assessment because OTs look at the functional implications of the individual's strengths and deficits, in terms of the job role. I have read through some vocational assessments done by Psychologists, and found that they relied almost entirely on the results of the testing. Whereas as an OT I look at a variety of issues like strategies to make for a safe working environment, graduated approaches for on-the-job training, deficit remediation, adaptive and assistive devices/technologies and all of these are unique to each client. However, vocational assessments done by Psychologists did not look at any of these issues, thus the real-world application of their recommendations was very limited in my opinion. I also do worksite assessments from a return-to-work perspective and this has a clear vocational focus as well. Needless to say a lot of this looks at the physical demands of a position, and how best a job incumbent could return to work with or without modifications to the responsibilities and the work place environment. However, this aspect of the OT role takes a more physical medicine and adaptive/assistive devices perspective based on issues like range-of-motion, the incumbent's physical endurance, fatigue and pain management. As regards Case Management, I also wear the hat of a Case Manager in my work. And this means that I enable and provide support to my client's around the management of their life issues. These range from medication compliance, mental status exams, therapeutically influencing clients to move to more productive social roles, vocational/educational goal-setting, training, housing, health management, life skills, income and community/socializing and leisure issues etc. Hope this is responsive to what you wanted to know, at least from a Canadian perspective. Best, Biraj Mr Michael Deen wrote: > G'day All, > > I have noticed from numerous discussions on this list that there appears to be quite > a bit of role conflict between OTs and PTs in the USA. Just wondering if there are > any role conflict concerns between OTs and Rehabilitation Counsellors. I work in > vocational rehabilitation in Australia and although I do not feel there are any > issues regarding role delineation between OTs and RCs I see that our underlying > theory is quite similar. > > Do OTs in the US (and/or other countries around the world) have much to do with RCs? > Do OTs in the US have much of a role in vocational rehabilitation or in case > management? > > Cheers > > Mike > > *****************************��********************************** > > To remove yourself from the OTnow mail list, send a message to: > > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > In the message's *body*, put the following text: > > unsubscribe OTlist > > - > > List messages are archived at: > > http://www.mail-archive.com/[EMAIL PROTECTED] > > *****************************��*********************************** *****************************��********************************** To remove yourself from the OTnow mail list, send a message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] In the message's *body*, put the following text: unsubscribe OTlist - List messages are archived at: http://www.mail-archive.com/[EMAIL PROTECTED] *****************************��***********************************
