Community reintegration and activity constraints significantly improved for people with chronic stroke after an 8-wk intervention combining yoga and group occupational therapy (OT) for fall risk management. Occupational therapists may wish to add yoga and group OT to community or hospital settings to improve similar outcomes.

This article examined the impact of Merging Yoga and Occupational Therapy intervention on balance, balance confidence, and fall risk factor management for people with stroke. All outcome measures improved with significant changes in balance, balance confidence, and two risk factor management assessments.

This article explains how even after one is discharged from therapy, how life is the best therapy and you can continue to still build strength. I saw a lot of this with finger amputations in my placement

This article explains the difference in the attitude an OT holds to their patients and how it affects the therapeutic relationship

Article explained of a systematic review on stroke patients

This presentation describes potential positive impacts on quality of life that social participation and meaningful activity groups can have on residents during their transition to assisted living. Occupational therapists possess distinct expertise in facilitating engagement in these areas.

Age, leisure activity participation, and depressive symptoms are all significant predictors of instrumental activity of daily living function. Occupational therapists can incorporate evidence-based interventions to address both depressive symptoms and leisure activity participation.

Advances in health care science allow more people with spinal cord injuries to live to old age. The purpose of this study was to determine those factors that contribute to the well-being of middle-aged and elderly spinal cord-injured people. One hundred spinal cord-injured people, ranging in age from 40 to 73 years, completed an extensive structured interview. In general, respondents reported a degree of well-being on the same measures of satisfaction and depression that was slightly lower than that of similarly aged nondisabled people. Pearson correlations indicated that people experiencing high levels of well-being reported high levels of perceived control, had higher levels of social support, and judged their health status to be good. These people also viewed their disability more favorably, tended to have higher incomes and more education, were employed, and were more religious than those indicating lower levels of well-being. The severity of the spinal cord injury was not correlated highly with subjective well-being, although there was a tendency for those with greater disability to report lower levels of well-being. People who were younger, who incurred their disability at a younger age, and who blamed themselves and felt they could have avoided the injury also tended to report higher levels of well-being.

This article explains why finding a mentor is so important as a new graduate which we will soon be. :)

As we move into the 21st century, there are increasing demands placed on occupational therapists to
ensure their practice is based on sound evidence. Evidence-based practice is an approach to clinical
decision making that has gained considerable interest and influence during the last decade. This
article describes and explains the process of evidence-based practice and its application to clinical
occupational therapy practice. Directions for resources that may assist therapists' self-directed
learning are also provided. As health care becomes more evidence-based, awareness of the principles,
skills, and resources for evidence-based practice is of relevance to all occupational therapists.

This explains more information about using NMES on an individual who has suffered from a stroke

This article discusses evidence regarding the effectiveness of treatment for people with Parkinson's disease. The researchers focused on a multidisciplinary approach within the inpatient rehabilitation environment. The study included 68 subjects with a diagnosis of Parkinson's. Throughout their length of stay, subjects participated in a combination of OT, PT, and ST for a minimum of 3 hours per day, 5-7 days per week. Intervention focused primarily on functional training, stretching, ROM, flexibility, and strengthening exercises. Following their intense rehabilitation, significant improvements in FIM total, cognitive, and motor scores were demonstrated in 71% of the subjects.

Evidence Connection articles provide a clinical application of systematic reviews developed in conjunction with the American Occupational Therapy Association's (AOTA's) Evidence-Based Practice project. The clinical condition discussed in this inaugural Evidence Connection article is adults with stroke. Findings from the systematic reviews on this topic were published in the January/February 2015 issue of the American Journal of Occupational Therapy and in AOTA's Occupational Therapy Practice Guidelines for Adults With Stroke (Wolf & Nilsen, 2015). Each article in this series will summarize the evidence from the published reviews on a given topic and presents an application of the evidence to a related clinical case. Evidence Connection articles illustrate how the research evidence from the reviews can be used to inform and guide clinical decision making.

This article dicusses the improvement of health care delivery from incorporating EBP into the care of patients. Evidence Based practice takes the most recent research and allows health care professional to implement the findings into the careers. This allows for enhancement of critical thinking, improve their skills and decision making and allows for the patient to get the best care possible.It also helps aid increase cost that occurs in the health care field.

https://evidence-based-practice.wikispaces.com/Benefits+of+EBP

The just gives a description of OT/COTA requirements in West Viriginia. The OT must do the initial evaluation and establish the POC. The COTA is responsible for delivery of the services based upon the OT evaluation and POC. The OT with less than a year of experience is required to see the COTA deliver these services once every two weeks and documentation is required for that. I will attach the link to show the different requirements for each state.

https://www.aota.org/~/media/corporate/files/secure/advocacy/licensure/stateregs/supervision/occupational%20therapy%20assistant%20supervision%20requirements%202016%20final%20jf%202%20edits.pdf

This website gives 5 key factors in professionalism. Professionalism is important in any career. James R. Ball wrote a book in 2001 titled, "Professionalism is for Everyone" and that is where he developed the 5 key factors for professionalism. The five factors are character counts, energy and attitude, pursuit of excellence, competency in the field, and code of conduct. These factors will help you be a successful professional in your field.

This article gives a spin on clinical reasoning in Occupational Therapy. It was described as a "largely tacit, highly imagistic, and deeply phenomenological mode of thinking" This article describes that it is more than the ability justify your reasoning with reasons, it requires you to have knowledge and experience in the field to successfully have clinical reasoning. This article explains that the more experience you get the better you become with clinical reasoning because it allows you to make sense of a disability with a particular individual and develop an approach based off of clinical reasoning for that particular individual.

This website provides a training approach with different activities and strategies to help develop the understanding of psychosocial needs as well as how to give the best person centered care. This is typically used in a long term care setting, but can be used in any setting with older adults. This website will help identify the developmental tasks of older adults, the myths people say about older adults, communication tips, and have a better understanding the impact it makes on communication when the 5 senses begin to decline.

http://www.kahsa.org/files/public/PsycosocialNeeds.pdf

As OT's, we are to develop a therapeutic relationship with our clients. It is our responsibility to understand the clients ethical beliefs to help build that therapeutic relationship. This research gives an analysis of 60 interviews verbatim with family members of elderly individuals in a particular community. It is important for us to understand these individuals thoughts and concerns as it can also have an impact on the different treatment methods we use for a particular client