Sexuality, personal care attendants, OT??

I totally recommend checking out this PDF (link below) if sexuality in OT is something that interests you at all. Well, you know. Not practicing sexuality. But how OT can play a role in it, or at the very least, needs to be aware that sexuality is potentially an important component to a person. Often times, whether or not the client mentions it is directly related to how “open” they think the OT will be in regards to discussing it. Some brave OTs flat out ask about it. I remember that when I was a student, I was giving a hand-out on sex positions to a man having a hip surgery (how to have sex with hip precautions), and he pointed to one of the positions and said to his wife “Remember this one?” AHAHAHAHAHA

 I skimmed this PDF and I was impressed with some of the things it covers, that you don’t typically see in print. A lot of it had to do with personal care attendants and whether or not they were comfortable with helping with sexuality, ranging from masturbation to positioning the person for sex, clean-up before and after, etc. Very intriguing. This PDF isn’t specifically meant for OTs, but I think has a lot of relevant points that OTs should be aware of.

This document (see link) came out in 2011 on attendant services and sexuality and I thought you would find it useful …(edited for brevity) But this document covers a real issue and is based on research in Sudbury and Toronto.

http://www.crncc.ca/knowledge/related_reports/pdf/Sexuality%20and%20Access%20Survey%20Summary.pdf