30 Apr 2010

peds and stickers

I'm starting to get more and more peds. Been an oddly busy week and I am worn out. I'm sticking around this weekend so should have more time than normal to catch up on stuff. I'm back to 120 new mails in my e-mail box and like 500 older ones to go through.

Pediatric idea of the day: to encourage supination and tactile discrimination, place stickers on pt's hands and underneath forearms, so pt has to turn over arm to find stickers and peel off.

You can also put the stickers on the bottom of their feet and have them peel them off a foot while seated on a theraball.

As always, be safe while performing any of these activities, blah blah.

Category: Occupational Therapy | Comments: 1

27 Apr 2010

Gearing up for the end of April! Almost end of OT month!!

Tomorrow is vocational rehab and inpatient or outpatient depending on census. Wednesday is all day satellite outpatient, and it's gonna be a challenge as it will be my busiest day in a long time. I think I'm seeing ages 3 to 50 with a huge range of diagnoses. I need to study up on my pediatrics as I am JUST finally after 8 months starting to get younger kids. 🙂 Augh! LOL.. I LOVE peds and I will learn what I need to learn, just intimidating!

I got to hold babies at a church nursery this weekend and it was so nice to hold babies after the looong time I didn't get to, I used to love holding babies in Special Care at LeBonheur. Plus it was nice to hold babies that didn't have tubing and lines and monitors…..it's pretty rare I get to hold healthy babies!

It's 11pm and I am tired so I am headed to bed. This past weekend I got to go to a Need to Breathe Concert in Birmingham AL and do a bunch of other fun things, but I just got home (GA state employees got today off because its Confederate Memorial day, HILARIOUSLY WEIRD to my CA-based mind)….so……good night.

Category: Occupational Therapy | Comments: none

23 Apr 2010

Happy OT Month and Happy OT LIFE :)

We had an inservice today n the Georgia Rehab Association, with an assortment of cookies n drinks! Yum! Tomorrow I send out the third week challenge for OT Month and announce the previous week winner who wins a free meal that was donated generously by Valley Food Service which runs our cafeteria! We'll also be in our monthly institute newsletter and I'm still working on the local newspaper thing.

Today I did two kitchen screenings and a microwave cooking session. We made hot cocoa and it took us 30 minutes to get to the step of microwaving the hot water. EVERY SINGLE DAY as I cook my meals, I marvel at how much I take for granted. How effortlessly I can glance at a  box, peel off a wrapper and stick something in an oven, without a second thought.

I finished up my eval on a child with ADHD, OCD, Asperger's, and DSI. Whew.  I am excited at the challenge. I'm also getting several other indirect sensory cases through the physical therapist I work with. Her friend is a physical therapist who said she is reading OT literature about her own daughter to learn more about sensory issues and that she is fascinated by it, and realized she has missed the boat for so long on the reason WHY some of her kids won't do something, if they have the ability. Turns out the missing puzzle piece had to do with sensory. She talked about how she used to fuss at her daughter for taking the bow out of her hair or wanting to wear very heavy tights out of season, but now realizes there are huge sensory components to those fights.

I stayed late today after work off the clock, chatting with an intern and coming up with ideas for her to do with patients. She thanked me and I was like….no worries, I LOVE OT. I have to remember that sometimes. Even when I am stressed out, even when I am doing things I dislike, even when I have bad days….while not ALL of the things I am doing I like, the bottom line is, i do LOVE the profession and I could talk OT all day every day without getting tired of it. The actual treatment may wear me out, but the talking about it, never.

Also she mentioned searching for project ideas and found a video with my voice! It was one I took of Julie a few years ago showing off her treatment idea. AHAHAHAHAA. It's so funny to me to realize so many people have done searches for various OT student stuff and seen my videos or ideas or whatever…makes me proud.

I've been gluten-free and mostly sugar/process-free for almost a month now, and while I wasn't doing so hot for a little while recently, I am starting to have some more energy. Maybe with this new burst of energy I can start catching up on blogging and e-mail. I know I know I've been saying that for like 3 years but i mean it this time, haha.

Category: Occupational Therapy | Comments: 2

22 Apr 2010

Random OT tidbit of the day

Idea of the day I stole from some forum….

If you have a child who needs to focus with minimal distractions on learning basic vocabulary words, tape large, single words all over a room you can make very dark and quiet. Then sit or lie on the floor (maybe with a weighted blanket to help calm a distractible child who needs sensory input) and shine a bright flashlight at one of those words at a time. Or they can be the ones to use the flashlight to find the words you had previously put up…

Tomorrow we are having cookies and milk (and other drinks) in the Rehab gym to celebrate OT Month, right before a quick inservice on the GA Rehab Association. I'm in charge of OT Month so hopefully tommorrow's little event will go well. 🙂

Karen

Category: Occupational Therapy | Comments: 1

21 Apr 2010

Always something in OT world….

Haitian refugees one day, children with sensory issues the next…you never know what you're going to get in occupational therapy!

Today I printed out a bunch of Creole words to incorporate into physical dysfunction; tonight I'm refreshing on sensory integration and the vestibular, tactile, proprioceptive issues that arise with dysfunction.

Learning new things every day!

Gotta get back to reading up, more later ….preparing for some adult CVAS and pediatric sensory issues for tomorrow in outpatient!

Category: Occupational Therapy | Comments: none

16 Apr 2010

It's OT Month!

I had a nightmare last night that a patient stopped me to ask if our next session would be meaningful. I was like um……I'll try!

I've been having a semi-rough time lately! For no good reason either. No one is pressuring me too much, I'm in a quiet community, I can go walking around a lake every night, I should feel very blessed to be where I am. But lately my self-esteem is at new levels of low when it comes to OT – I know as a new grad (I've been an OT 7 months now), and especially as a grad spending most of my time without any other OTs around, I am not expected to be amazing. Especially when I'm dealing with everything from strokes to car accidents to hand injuries to cerebral palsy etc – its awesome OT is so diverse. But I do all sorts of research and get advice and yet I still feel utterly complexed. Ugh. I'm definitely way too hard on myself!

I'm in charge of OT Month – will have to blog asap about how that is going. This weekend should be pretty quiet so maybe I will catch up on random stuff around here and blog-wise, e-mail wise, etc…

So on that cheery and inspiring note (haha(, Hope everyone else out there is having a happy OT Month!!!

PS: So while I know some people will spit at the very idea of theraputty, if you DO use theraputty, my new fav thing to do with it is like have the outline of a square or other shape made out of tape on the table and you put the putty in the middle and they have to spread it out to the perimeter of the shape….

Category: Occupational Therapy | Comments: 2