Remember When...

When I first began observing occupational therapy practitioners, I was relatively new to the idea of occupational therapy. I knew the basic idea however, the difference between occupational therapy and physical therapy was still blurry to me. I think one of the most helpful settings I ever observed was an outpatient hospital rehabilitation clinic. In this setting, each department had their own personal office however, there was a common gym where both physical therapy and occupational therapy occurred. This allowed me to see the differences in the therapies on a side by side basis because many of the clients would move from physical therapy and come immediately to occupational therapy. When I think back on gray areas from what I am learning in school, much of the individuals seemed to focus a lot on exercise therapy in both occupational therapy and physical therapy. I think reasoning for this could either be that many times if there was an upper extremity injury, it was sent to occupational therapy and lower extremity was sent to physical therapy. Therefore, it is strengthening was important in the upper extremity work. If I could go back, I would also pay more attention in evaluations in order to see how patient preferences affect the therapy strategy. I don't think that I had this in mind when I was observing various evaluations.

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