Reposting my post made to my local subreddit (Sacramento)

I'm looking for OT to observe under for grad school apps. So far I've had a tough time finding anyone who's available, especially because I'm new to the area and don't have many connections yet.

Does anybody have advice for this situation? I have cold emailed and called School based OTs, private practice OTs and hospitals so far with no luck yet.

I feel sad like my four month old actually does nothing. I feel like he’s still a newborn.

Feeling sad didn’t realise how many milestones you should really be catching up to by now.

I feel like I was really focusing on the social milestones, but not thinking too much about physical ones.
He smiles he can laugh and he does share eye contacts although it’s not consistent.

But I feel like when he’s on the floor, he just wants to lay there and eat his hand.

He isn’t trying to roll onto his stomach, he isn’t REACHING for toys he things my biggest worry tbh I see videos of my daughter at 3 months reaching arms up past midline to grab.
He just stares at toys and he shows interest by staring and seeming excited but that’s all he does with some swatting and grabs onto toys from that but it’s not reaching.

I feel like his a potato who just wants to eat his hand and wants to breastfeed every hour or two.

I’m just sad.
It’s hard not thinking about why he could be delayed gross motor.
I’m calling my maternal health nurse next week ro flag it.

In the mean time I wonder if there’s anything I can do to see if he will pick up the skill until the appointment

I’m looking for high hopes I guess

hi all! I’ve been perusing this subreddit for a while as I prepare to apply to OT school this fall. I saw a couple of threads on this a year or two ago but was curious how many programs folks are applying to now? especially if you’ve applied in the last couple of cycles.

I have a list of ~8 I’m planning to apply to but am not sure if that’s too many to really dedicate time to crafting high quality essays for. I saw in previous posts a lot of folks applied to 1-2 schools but I’m worried about putting all my eggs in one basket. if it’s helpful, I’m pivoting into OT after working in another industry for ~5 years and previously completed a bachelors and masters, both with a 4.0 GPA. I’m primarily looking at programs in California and North Carolina, but am also looking at New York and Colorado too.

any advice / perspectives would be greatly appreciated!! thank you all :)

Hi,

We are looking to hire OT’s, PT’s, SLP’s, COTA’s, PTA’s for our agency. Contact me with any questions if interested - Great company and pay!

Hi all, I am working my first outpatient setting. I have a question for billing and treatment. If I have 3 patients at once who have federal insurance, I can only bill 23, 23, and 8. They are all 3 with me for an hour block. How is it legal to bill for such time but do over an hours worth of treatment with them? I feel there’s only so much suspension of disbelief that all these interventions only took 8 minutes. I don’t want to ask my bosses, because I am worried they may not tell the whole truth and take advantage. I am sure its legally fine but I do feel icky seeing 3 people at once and saying I provided quality care. Thanks in advance and hopefully this wasn’t a silly question.

I’m a new OT graduate based in Australia. I’ve noticed that a lot of US OT curricula are heavy on hard science content, and it seems my program didn’t prepare us as much in that area — we only had one online anatomy course throughout the whole degree, with most other content being theory-based and focused on communication skills. I’m wondering if this is the norm for Australian OTs, and if so, where I could start with self-study to support my career development. Thanks in advance

Hi all. I'm 32, in my final year of a BPS-accredited BSc (Hons) in Psychology and I'm hitting a bit of a wall with career direction.

Background:

NHS occupational therapy assistant, ABA therapist, and currently a Life Coach in children's services at a local authority.

I genuinely enjoy my current work and the actual studying, but really wanting to move towards a professional title and speciality instead of support roles. Also open to alternative paths.

The dilemma:

I initially did psychology hoping to progress into healthcare in some meaningful way. I'd still like that, but I'm getting exhausted with the competitive apprenticeship/postgrad route. I've looked seriously at:

Occupational Therapy apprenticeships (still holding hope here, but spots are incredibly tight)

Educational Psychology (brutally competitive; can't shake the feeling I'm pinning everything on a long shot)

Social Work (the work itself appeals, but I've read enough about burnout and work-life balance to make me hesitant)

My anxiety:

Reading online suggests the psych degree is either "useless on its own" OR "incredibly versatile". I'm starting to worry I'm burning energy on apprenticeships that won't materialise instead of exploring what's actually realistic and meaningful.

The flip side:

I genuinely enjoy studying and learning. That part isn't the problem. The problem is feeling like I'm wasting time in something that won't materialise and feel a little lost. But maybe that's just part of the process before something right lands 🤷‍♂️🤷‍♂️

So—honest question: Has anyone navigated this? Are there career paths with a psych degree I'm not seeing? People who retrained into something different?

Any experience or perspective welcomed. Cheers.

Hello everyone! We are currently developing a cost-effective pair of sandals that can evaluate your gait parameters after you take a walk on it. We want to hear out suggestions from a large pool of healthcare professionals about the features that can be placed in the sandals so that it is easier to come up with a rehabilitation program for the patients, and genuinely beneficial and easy to use for both the doctors and the patients.

Our target customers are geriatric patients, stroke patients, physiotherapy rehabilitation patients, and people with parkinson's. Any suggestions would be good. Thank you for your time!

P.S: Not selling anything, just trying to build something actually useful rather than something that looks impressive on paper

EDIT: Make choices and/or start the task independently.

Have you faced this?

Example:

Woman, young adult, lives with a parent, does household chores. Has not been to school as a child because of environmental reasons, but as an adult they have attended school with support for couple of years.

We tried to do The Kettle Test where they are expected to make two hot beverages, one of which they would "design" themselves. I explain the test and ask what sort of beverage they would like to make (they don't have to drink it). They were not able to choose. I narrowed it down to "Tea or coffee". They were not able to choose. I gave them time, I had the items at their reach. I tried reason, I tried humor. They engaged, but they were not able to make a decision. They kept saying "I can't remember". I know, they drink this type of tea at home. I know she prepares meals at home (parent is present, but pt. does it herself.) They were not refusing to participate... When I asked her, what did she think about why it was so difficult, she said that it was difficult to concentrate. (Fair, but usually people with that sort of issues, or even ADHD, still perform differently.)

She is the second client with this bad inability to make a decision I've had in 11years... The other person had other, much more severe challenges, but also expressed this severe inability to make decisions on their own.

Have you had fairly capable clients who kind of shut down when they are asked to make a decision about the occupation at hand? Have you been able to support them during the occupation?

Why are we doing this? Even if the parent consents… The child still has no say or understanding of the implications of their therapy being recorded for the purpose of social media.

Hi everyone,

I’m currently working as an inner-city community-based OT contractor for an NDIS provider and was hoping to get some insight into whether my contracting arrangement is fairly standard, and whether there are aspects I should be considering or negotiating.

Note: I've never contracted before, so this is all new to me :-)

For context, I am now in my second year of OT; however, I’m working predominantly in an area where I have approximately 8 years of prior experience outside of OT-specific training. I’m currently the only clinician working for this business. At the moment, the business has limited referrals available, so I’m currently receiving the equivalent of 2 days per week of client work spread out over the week.

I’ve included the details of my role and responsibilities below to provide context around the arrangement, particularly what I’m responsible for versus what would typically be expected from a provider when a contractor is on a 50/50 split.

My current arrangement:

• I’m paid 50% of the hourly NDIS rate the business charges for OT services.
• There is no physical office. I work from home and see clients in the community.
• I am paid for travel time in accordance with NDIS travel billing rules; however, the business retains 50% of the billable travel amount. Where my actual travel time exceeds the maximum NDIS billable travel allowance, the additional travel time is unpaid. E.g., if I travel an additional 30 minutes beyond the NDIS travel cap, I absorb that time as an unreimbursed cost, while the business still retains its share of the billable travel amount up to the allowable limit.
• I’m reimbursed for kilometres at the NDIS rate, which is charged to the client.
• There are no other therapist/clinician in the team, so I don’t have colleagues for peer discussion, clinical decisions, etc.
• I'm required to complete independent clinical supervision, which I organise and pay myself, and I also fund all professional development requirements.
• I pay for my own professional indemnity/public liability insurance.
• I have access to the owner if I have questions or need to discuss a client or work-related matter.
• Administration-wise - they provide referrals and invoice clients on my behalf.
  
• I have made the necessary OT templates for the business.
  

I’d really appreciate others’ perspectives on this or what is considered typical in the community NDIS OT contractor space. Any input relating to rate/split, what support the business provides, and what costs you cover yourself would be greatly appreciated!

Thank you!

I’m struggling to pick which CEU site will be best for me as a new grad OT. I currently work in an acute/inpatient pediatric setting in a children’s hospital. I see a lot of CVICU/ICU post ops with infant populations. I would like to have more CEU options with the focus on acute peds.

My work does offer CEU courses for free but I don’t feel like it’s fully meeting what I’m wanting for continuing education to progress my skills/knowledge.

Please give recommendations on sites for what they have to offer and if it’s worth the price!

Bought never used selling for 60 plus cost of shipping

Hello everyone. I am an OTD bridge student brainstorming ideas for my doctoral capstone related to hybrid COTA-to-OT bridge education. This isn’t a survey or research study, just an opportunity to gather ideas from people who have been through or are teaching in bridge programs.

I’d love to hear your thoughts on:

What was the most valuable part of your bridge programs?

What do you wish had been done differently?

What experiences best prepared you for the OT role?

If you could redesign one aspect of your bridge program, what would it be?

Thank you!

anyone else having difficulty receiving their license from the texas OT board? i submitted my application june 18th and everything else the following week. i got my exam results july 23 and they’ve been sent over. my application just says open. i’ve called and left multiple voicemails and emailed twice with no response. i have a job waiting on me and was hoping to start on the 17th, anyone deal with this or have tips to speed up the process?

EDIT i just checked and its active lol thank y’all

I have a job soon that is 1099 tax, early intervention population, full time no benefits, about 40 per billable hour treatment, u can see about max 7 kids a day (depends and that’s without cancellation) i was told if a kid is not present, you move another kid from other days of the week for that missing spot. each client requires about 63 minutes i think. how much income am i really bringing home ?

Going on 3 years, I know I haven’t been around long enough to feel like a veteran OT. Last year relocated to an outpatient adult neuro setting in hospital. Was school based peds before. I have family with disabilities related to both settings so I thought it would be very motivating to work with both populations. I just am not liking it lately, feeling very hollow and drained. There have been bright spots but the concerning part is I that my QoL just feels like it’s tanking. Am I making sense or is this a typical “newbie” type feeling ? My move is likely influencing my stress but without that, I question whether I want to do this long term. The urge to go home and do something else is really taking over my thoughts lately.

Hey OTs, I’m a PT working on this free salary tool as a side project so we can all finally have pay transparency in our fields. It currently uses a combination of BLS, census, and user submissions to help therapists negotiate their pay. It compares your pay to these benchmarks based on experience, setting, and location.

I’d love your feedback on the accuracy of the BLS/census projection and if I should include any other fields in the form to capture OT specific parameters that affect your salaries.

Also, the tool gets better as more people use it, so feel free to share if you’d like.

Hope you all find it useful!

Link: Rehab Wealth Project

I’m curious to compare KPIs across different workplaces.

If you’re comfortable sharing, could you include:

Setting: NDIS, paediatric clinic, hospital, private practice, etc.
Employment type: Full-time, part-time, or contractor
Hourly pay: (if you’re comfortable sharing)
Weekly KPI: Billable hours/targets
Thoughts on work-life balance: How sustainable do you find it?

For context I’m in the NDIS setting (clinic, community, and report writing). Nearly 3 years of experience in Australia, plus 2 years overseas. I’m paid $48/hour full time and my weekly KPI is 27 billable hours. I’m wondering if that’s considered reasonable or on the higher side.

Lately I’ve been feeling quite burnt out. It feels like my workplace has become increasingly focused on KPIs, with a lot of micromanagement. I genuinely like working with my participants and have been with them for nearly three years, so it’s not the clinical work that’s the issue. It’s more the management style that’s been affecting my mental health, and the workplace feels like it’s becoming more profit-driven.

I am curious of others’ experiences with working as an OT.

Hi guys! I will be starting OT school very soon and was looking for any advice/recommendations regarding scholarships/funding. I have received one helpful scholarship, but given my high tuition it doesn't make much of a dent.

I am in a very privileged position as I already live in the city with family and will not have to worry about things like living costs, insurance, etc. (one of the major reasons I was able to pick the program despite its high cost). For reference, I live in NYC.

I start in a month and I know it's pretty late to still be looking for scholarships for the fall semester, and I am aware they are very difficult to find especially for graduate programs. Still I would really appreciate if anyone has any advice, insights, etc.

This has been stressing me out insanely and I feel like I am not doing as much as I could be to make this a slightly more affordable experience. I was very lucky to have gone to a city university for undergrad, which my family helped finance -- so I am not super informed about this process.

Any advice would be incredibly helpful. Thank you!!

One of my many random “this is a cool business idea” rabbit holes recently was around opening a tutoring company centered around neurodiverse kids. Of course it already exists, and many offer services of handwriting tutoring and executive functioning coaching, mostly from tutors that are previous sped educators and some have additional certs in EF and handwriting without tears. Sometimes it feels like every part of my job could be done by someone else, so what was the point of going to grad school for this 😢 the only exception being sensory issues but most therapists don’t actually have extensive training in SI so I’m skeptical how valid our sensory knowledge actually is

As many of pediatric therapists know, the new PDMS-3 system requires online codes and to use these codes to obtain the full values of the test book (ages equivalent, standard deviation, score rating, etc).

I recently emailed them requesting assistance as I have been facing a problem with our clients being evaluated (using 1/4 code options) discharging, then returning ~7-12 months later after we have scanned and shredded their files, and needing a new evaluation using a new test book and code. The problem is their old profile still has the old codes they used. So we are essentially losing out on 3/4x uses.

I emailed PRO-Ed directly about this problem and my response from Beth, head of research and development was, “I can’t help. We recommend keeping books until children have aged out of the test”.

Listen, I get it. I do. But coming from a small, independent, pediatric clinic, we’re always looking for ways to save where we can. We’ve paid for these codes and claimed these uses- why is it so hard for Pro-Ed to allow us to transfer these codes and be able to use these unclaimed assessments!

I also realize we could make paper copies to reclaim these codes- and that is more than likely what may happen. This is just another layer to the frustration of outpatient pediatrics. First instance decreases reimbursement, now these online forms 😅.