Working as a COTA in a prn status has its advantages, but it also has it disadvantages too. As much as the flexibility of setting your own schedule is nice, some days there is no need for extra help.   So working prn status you can set the hours and days you prefer to work. That is nice for times when you need a day off for a ...

  Just this week I had a patient who made my day. This person was very friendly, willing to participate addressing all of their goals, and had some great stories. It made the entire treatment pass so quickly I went way over the scheduled time.   But this got me thinking about patients I've worked with over the years, especially some ...

  You might have seen this in the news, but the presidents federal Health Care Fraud and Abuse Program are hard at work uncovering scams in the system. In 2012 alone they were able to recover $4.2 billion from both companies and individuals who were trying to cheat the system. This was the highest three year total recovered since the ...

  Just the other day I was talking with one of the nurses I work with, and we got into a discussion of wasted dollars in healthcare. One of the patients was upset because for three days in a row the lab nurse came to draw blood. Another patient was mad because they were being sent out to the hospital for a routine procedure that could have ...

The U.S. Department of Education today issued a statement declaring public schools at the K-12 level must provide opportunities for students with disabilities to participate in athletic programs. A U.S. General Accounting Office (GAO) report in 2010 found that many schools do not provide students with disabilities ways to participate in ...

This quarter we are finishing our projects on promoting occupational therapy's role in prevention and wellness. My group's topic is adolescents diagnosed with or at risk for obesity, as this is a hot button topic right now it has become difficult to carve a niche that has not been addressed so we have changed our focus to promoting the ...

Brand new data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) say ADHD is on the rise. From 1998-2000 through 2007-2009, the percentage of children who had ever been diagnosed with the condition rose from 7 percent to 9 percent. In the Midwest and South, it hits 10 percent.In the report summary, the authors made a point to note that one ...

Last week, New York legislators passed a bill mandating coverage of autism screening, diagnosis and treatment. The legislation, approved by both houses of the legislature, would require insurers in the state to cover services including OT, PT and speech, as well as routine toddler screenings and behavioral health interventions, according to the ...

OT often looks relatively low-tech - traditional craft modality are usually no batteries required, same with ADLs and assistive devices like sock donners and built-up utensils. But that's not to say that technology has no place in OT. Quite the opposite, in fact. An article in yesterday's San Francisco Chronicle trumpets the advent of a new iPad ...

The Sensory Processing Foundation (SPDF) has created a special Web page to educate therapists who want to comment on the new draft of the DSM-5, the latest diagnostic manual for mental health disorders now under review by the American Psychatric Association (APA).  The URL is ...