There's a legal term called standing.
"The legal right to bring a lawsuit. As a general rule, only a
person with something at stake has standing to bring a lawsuit."
As I understand it, "standing" means that a person has a legal basis for
brining a claim against another entity. I'm sure there's a lot more to the
term, but that's my basic understanding.
While driving the other day, it dawned on me that in so many settings and
with so many people OT has little to no standing. I'm not talking in a legal
sense, instead in the sense of what our profession offers.
When I think about my home health company, OT is such a non-entity. We have
so few OT compared to PT. OT can't open a case. OT very rarely stands alone.
OT is rarely called upon as EXPERTS in anything, unless it's fine motor. OT
is not recognized by the majority of patients. OT is often not referred to
by the MD.
For me, the bottom line is that OT hardly even exists as a highly valued
profession. In fact, I was thinking yesterday, what happens to the VAST
majority of home health patients not getting home health? How is it that I
"sell" my services as invaluable, but most patients don't get the services?
The obvious answer is OT services are NOT invaluable and that patients
apparently do just fine when receiving PT only.
Again, just another missing piece of our confusing puzzle....
Ron
~~~
Ron Carson MHS, OT
www.OTnow.com
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