The rapport between an OT and a patient is so tight, it’s like your friends laughing about an inside joke you just don’t get. I want to know more about this bond and the ability to get patients to buy in on the difficult tasks at hand (no pun intended).
I met with my 2 friends from my outpatient neuro days and asked them for insight on counseling and person-centered care. Amanda Saylor and Becca Carr are the creators of @neuro_ots; an instagram platform for therapy ideas for outpatient neuro occupational therapists. They also teach webinars and support products that are specific to their population.
Counseling was an familiar topic to them since it is something they incorporate into their therapy everyday.
Their main points on counseling were:
Therapeutic use of self
Validating feelings
They mentioned that they had these concepts discussed and trained during their graduate studies and put into practice when working with patients independently. As for most SLPs like myself, this is a relatively new concept and I have been an SLP for over 15 years.
Moving on, if you are an empathetic person (I sure hope so if you want to do well in this field) these concepts will come naturally.
THERAPEUTIC USE OF SELF:
Collaborating- Including patient in all aspects of therapeutic process
Empathazing- Doing what you can to truly understand the client’s inner experience
Encouraging-Enhancing motivation
Advocating-Assisting the client to access information and resources
Instructing-Teaching the client
Problem-solving- Jointly addressing the client’s concerns
VALIDATING FEELINGS:
This is knowing that you are being cared for. Having the client be heard and seen.
“I can see that your are very _____(insert feeling)”
”I can see you are making an effort”
SIG 2 ASHA perspectives summarizes some of the counseling skills needed to build therapeutic alliance with PWA (Persons with Aphasia).
Person-centered care for a neuro OT is my favorite part to watch how they adapt and modify ADLS (activities of daily living like toileting and dressing) and IADLS (i.e., finances). They mentioned that they get the most out of a patient when they focus on “task analysis”.
I love this word “task analysis”
For an OT is looking at the physical, cognitive and sensory components of a task.
For example, a client would like to continue making school lunches for their children. After the task analysis, the exercises in OT can be focused on the targeted task by adapting, and providing exercises that would mimic the physical movements of this task. Lastly (one of my favorite OT tasks) the cognitive needs are assessed and modified for the patient.
I hope this gives some perspective from OT to you. Below you’ll find the ASHA perspectives and citation for OT article on self-efficacy.
Whether you’re an OT or not, can you share a task analysis? Make sure you co-treat with an OT sometime; you’ll get lots of insight!
>https://pubs.asha.org/doi/10.1044/2021_PERSP-20-00298
Opseth, T. M., Carstensen, T., Yazdani, F., Ellingham, B., Thørrisen, M. M., Bonsaksen, T., & Cheng, M. (2017). Self-efficacy for therapeutic mode use among occupational therapy students in Norway. Cogent Education, 4(1). https://doi.org/10.1080/2331186X.2017.1406630
