What is Occupational Therapy?
Occupational therapy assists infants, toddlers, children, adolescents, and adults to develop the necessary skills through everyday life activities (referred to as occupations) in order to enable participation in their roles, habits, routines, school, community, and workplace.
Also, occupational therapists promote independence in their main occupations of daily living including activities of daily living (e.g., getting dressed, eating, bathing, toileting, transferring), instrumental activities of daily living (e.g., care of others, care of pets, financial management, etc), play, leisure, sleep, education, social participation, and work.
Some of the areas that occupational therapy specializes in are:
- Fine Motor/Bilateral Coordination Skills
- Gross Motor Skills
- Activities of Daily Living (ADL)/Self Care Skills
- Executive Function/Attention Skills
- Social/Pragmatic Skills
- Handwriting Skills
- Visual Motor/Visual Perceptual Skills
- Sensory Integration/Motor Planning
- Self Regulation Skills
- Cognitive Skills
- Play Skills
Some of the benefits of occupational therapy include:
- Improvement in fine motor skills
- Improvement in feeding, dressing, and hygiene skills
- Improvement in visual motor/ perceptual skills
- Regulation of arousal levels for participation in functional activities
- Increased socialization, organizational skills, and self confidence
- Development of a sensory diet
- Improvement in sensory processing
How do we become exceptional Occupational Therapists?
Occupational therapists, as defined by the National Board for Certification in Occupational Therapy (NBCOT), are professionals who receive the Registered Occupational Therapist OTR certification, which requires Level I Fieldwork, Level II Fieldwork, and requires a master’s or doctoral degree in Occupational Therapy from an ACOTE®-accredited occupational therapy (OT) program.
Who can Occupational Therapists work with?
Children that may benefit from occupational therapy have may or may not have the following diagnoses that would include, but are not limited to:
- Handwriting difficulties
- Sensory Integrative Dysfunction
- ADD/ADHD
- Autism Spectrum Disorder/Asperger’s
- Cerebral Palsy
- Fine motor delays
- Sensory Processing Disorder
- Down Syndrome
- Spinal cord injuries
- Handwriting difficulties
- Sensory Integrative Dysfunction
- ADD/ADHD
- Autism Spectrum Disorder/Asperger’s
- Cerebral Palsy
- Fine motor delays
- Sensory Processing Disorder
- Down Syndrome
- Spinal cord injuries
- Hypotonia
- Brachial Plexus injury
- Coordination difficulties
- Congenital abnormalities
- Limited independence with self care skills
- Genetic disorders
- Traumatic brain injury
- Developmental delay
- Handwriting difficulties
- Sensory Integrative Dysfunction
- ADD/ADHD
- Autism Spectrum Disorder/Asperger’s
- Cerebral Palsy
- Fine motor delays
- Sensory Processing Disorder
- Down Syndrome
- Spinal cord injuries
Contact Us
If you have any questions or would like to book an appointment, please call 888.EST.TELE or fill out the form below.
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