Clinical forums Join one of our Clinical forums Clinical Forum: Dementia and Mental HealthThe dementia and mental health forum of the older persons specialist section aims to enable practitioners, students, researchers and/or educators to develop their occupation-focused practice with people with dementia or mental health needs. The forum supports development in a number of areas, identified by existing forum members, including: Connection between members to build collaborative practices, research and education. Use of occupation-focused, evidence-based interventions in practice. Articulation and evaluation of expertise in occupation-focused practice to justify occupational need to service stakeholders. Nurturing occupation-focused practices and progressing beyond assessment and diagnosis of dementia or mental health conditions, towards preventative and therapeutic occupational practice. The forum aims to achieve these aims through provision of learning opportunities, social learning spaces and learning resources for members. The following resources are intended to support practitioners, students, researchers and/or educators. It provides references for recommended seminal texts, practice guidelines and strategy, research, as well as links to videos and websites that may support development of thinking about occupation with people with dementia. The forum will work with the specialist section to deliver two CPD webinars to members each year and to disseminate relevant news and developments through the SSOP newsletter. The dementia and mental health forum has also previously been involved with the development of practice guidelines for occupational therapy for people with dementia, which was supported by the RCOT Practice Publications Group. It aims to continue to support such projects, as well as encouraging engagement in participatory and collaborative research projects that both involves and are led by clinicians and people living with dementia or older people with mental health needs. Introducing the Forum Leads Louise Howe Email: ssopenquiries@gmail.com Twitter: @LouiseH05500526 I began my OT career in 1999, graduating from the University of East Anglia. Over the last 20 years I have worked in a range of mental health services. In 2011 I took a role as advanced practitioner at Nottingham University Hospitals where I worked to develop the OT service for people with dementia, on the Medical Mental Health Unit, an acute medical ward for people with dementia and delirium. This was a fantastic opportunity to develop a new service and to put my OT skills into practice in an unfamiliar setting. I worked with the ward staff to expand the use of person-centred care practices with a focus on enablement in activities of daily living. I set up a programme of activity on the ward and following its impact, successfully expanded the activity coordinator team. I developed a multidisciplinary tool for risk enablement and led this process to facilitate discharges from the ward. During this time I completed an MSc in Advanced Occupational Therapy, including a project in the use of multi-sensory environments for people with dementia and a dissertation in risk enablement. More recently I have worked in a dementia outreach service, supporting care homes with residents who presented with challenging behaviour. This was a great opportunity to use of different strategies and approaches to enable the care home staff to understand the people they cared for and reduce the distress faced by certain residents. We utilised many approaches including person centred care, life history work, reminiscence, meaningful activity and sensory interventions. I am currently based at the University of Nottingham, on a large multi-site randomised controlled trial called Promoting Activity, Independence and Stability in Early Dementia (PrAISED). The year long multidisciplinary intervention provides rehabilitation to people newly diagnosed with dementia. My role is to contribute to the development of the intervention from an occupational therapy perspective and to train and support the therapists delivering the intervention across our 5 UK sites. I am also completing a PhD in health care studies based on evaluating our multi-disciplinary training programme. I am interested in the complete journey for people with dementia from diagnosis to full care. I feel that the occupational therapy profession has a lot to offer to reduce the impact of symptoms, keep people safe and active, and improve quality of life. Niamh Kinsella Email: ssopenquiries@gmail.com Twitter: @NiamhKinsella I am an occupational therapy clinician, educator and researcher, with a particular interest and experience in practice with people with dementia. My work with people with dementia began as an occupational therapy student, when I became interested in their experiences of the healthcare system and opportunities for occupation within the system and local communities. I subsequently explored the evidence-based approaches to occupational therapy that are used to support people with dementia through PhD research, and identified a number of healthcare service and cultural conditions that need to be improved in order to effectively support people with dementia to engage in occupation. I currently work in the west of Scotland with a community dementia team, where I am working to use this research knowledge in practice and to continue to develop skills in right-based and community development approaches to practice. This has enabled me to develop and articulate the therapeutic and strategic skills that are required to enhance occupation-focused practice, which I am keen share and discuss with colleagues, students and researchers. With previous experience as a lecturer and, currently, as a clinical educator, I have a passion for sharing knowledge through creative and community-based approaches to learning. I am grateful to have the opportunity to co-lead the dementia forum, which I hope will continue to enable practitioners to connect nationally and internationally. I believe that this will promote effective sharing of knowledge about different approaches to practice and encourage creativity or innovation when working with people with dementia. Reading SWAFFER, K., 2016. What the hell happened to my brain? Living beyond dementia. Jessica Kingsley Publishers. SABAT, S., 2019. Dementia Beyond Pathology: What People Diagnosed Can Teach Us About Our Shared Humanity. Bioethical Inquiry. Vol. 16, pp. 163 – 172. MARSHALL, M., (ed.) (2005) Perspectives on Rehabilitation and Dementia. London: Jessica Kingsley. KITWOOD, T., 1997. Dementia Reconsidered: the person comes first. UK: McGraw Hill Education. Research DU TOIT, S. H. J., XIZI, S. and MCGRATH, M., 2019. Meaningful engagement and person-centred residential dementia care: a critical interpretive synthesis. Scandinavian Journal of Occupational Therapy. Vol. 26, no. 5, pp. 343-355. Swinson T, Wenborn J, Hynes S, et al. Community occupational therapy for people with dementia and their family carers: A national survey of United Kingdom occupational therapy practice. British Journal of Occupational Therapy. 2016;79(2):85-91. doi: 10.1177/0308022615624447 Maki Y, Endo H. The contribution of occupational therapy to building a dementia-positive community. British Journal of Occupational Therapy. 2018;81(10):566-570. doi:10.1177/0308022618774508 https://www-tandfonline-com.knowledge.idm.oclc.org/doi/full/10.1080/1360... Practice guidelines & Strategy https://www.nice.org.uk/guidance/ng97 https://www.nice.org.uk/guidance/ng32 https://www.who.int/publications/i/item/global-action-plan-on-the-public-health-response-to-dementia-2017---2025 Videos & Media https://www.ted.com/talks/anne_basting_how_to_meaningfully_reconnect_with_those_who_have_dementia https://www.ted.com/talks/tony_luciani_a_mother_and_son_s_photographic_journey_through_dementia Contribute to the Forum The forum is for our members to share projects, best practice and provide CPD opportunities. There are different ways you can contribute, for example Host a webinar to tell us about an aspect of your practice or hold a topical discussion. Write a newsletter article for the SSOP monthly newsletter to share a project you are involved with. Share learning from recent courses or training via an article for the newsletter. Share your thoughts on an article, book or guidance that you have read that might be of interest to other forum members via the newsletter. Get in contact with us if you have any ideas of topics that you would like to see covered by the forum or newsletter. Perhaps consider tweeting about key issues or areas of good practice within this specialty @RCOT_OP. Cognitive Rehabilitation Here is a link to the introductory video to GREAT cognitive rehabilitation. https://vimeo.com/664773182 You can find out more about GREAT Cognitive Rehabilitation on the University of Exeter website. www.exeter.ac.uk/great And you can download the Bangor Goal Setting Interview, Jackie shares here. https://medicine.exeter.ac.uk/reach/publications/ Here is a link for My Life, My Goals, a self-help resource based on the GREAT cognitive rehabilitation designed for people with dementia and their family/friends. https://www.alzheimers.org.uk/sites/default/files/2021-09/my-life-my-goals-workbook.pdf?dm_t=0,0,0,0,0 The GREAT Cognitive Rehabilitation e – learning course can be accessed via the NHS e-learning hub. You will need to make an account using an NHS, SS or UK university email address and then the course can be found by searching for ‘cognitive rehabilitation’. The course is modular, and the website should save your progress. https://learninghub.nhs.uk/ If you don’t have one of the above email addresses, you can access the course on the University of Exeter website. It is the same course, but I don’t think it saves your progress. https://sites.google.com/exeter.ac.uk/great-cr/for-practitioners/elearning-course?authuser=0 Clinical Forum: Acute Care and EmergencyThe following information is updated regularly, please let us know if there is any other information you would like to see. Forum leads Catherina Nolan I am an acute care hospital based occupational therapist. I qualified in 1999 from University of Cardiff, College of Medicine. I have worked in both the community and the hospital environment and my specialist area is older people's services. I currently work for Kings College Hospital NHS Foundation Trust and have spent all of my working career in and around London. I have set up a seven day occupational therapy service in accident and emergency department in my local hospital site. I am the Clinical lead Occupational Therapist across older people's services on 2 sites within the Trust inclusive of acute frailty and frailty rehabilitation services. I completed My MSc in Advanced occupational therapy practice with a specialism in older people. My dissertation was on clinical reasoning of novice versus advanced practitioners in discharging older people from acute care. I am a practising clinician and have been a member of the SS Older People since its inception. I represent the COT SS Older People on the Royal College of Physicians Falls Fragility Fracture Audit Programme (FFFAP). I work 2 days a week for the NHS England and NHS Improvement Strategic Clinical Network -Frailty, London region as a senior clinical project manager. I strongly believe in evidence based practice driving occupational therapy and supporting the great work we do. I have a passion for occupation focused lens on acute care. I have a thirst for ever developing new knowledge and am a strong advocate for sharing best practice. My contact details are: ssopenquiries@gmail.com Lauren Goodchild I’m newly appointed to the co-lead role and have an interest in this specialist area. I qualified in 2015 from York St John University and since then have worked as an acute Occupational Therapist. I have worked for two trusts in the North East of England. I have worked in many areas including; acute stroke, orthopaedics, vascular, respiratory, surgery, however, the area I enjoyed most of all was working with the older population. I recently had the opportunity to lead a project on the admission unit, this project highlighted the importance of admission avoidance and early therapy input to prevent deterioration of function in frail older patients. I was keen to learn more about acute and emergency care for older people and joined RCOT’s specialist section. Through joining I hoped to improve and encourage networking across the country and to ensure best practice. Since being elected into the co-lead, I have applied for a new role with my current trust as an advanced Occupational Therapist in the newly commissioned frailty service and hope to start in the new role in the upcoming weeks. I am sure my new role with the specialist section will play a role in helping to develop this new service. I hope to be able to share experiences and knowledge from developing this new service with forum members. I feel through shared learning and developing a more standardised approach across the country this will help ensure quality of services for older people who require emergency and acute care. My contact details are; ssopenquiries@gmail.com Most importantly, we need your input to make this a useful forum for us all. So please do get in touch directly or look at the website regularly, let us know what you are doing and share your thoughts with others via the discussion forum. We are active on Twitter and can be contacted via the Specialist Section handle (@COTSS-OP) or our own accounts: @Lagoodchild and @NolanRuffle Latest Updates: Webinar Subject title to be confirmed -May 2020 This webinar can still be accessed online for the next 6 months after the event. Recent publications: How Older People interact with social care and the market - WHICH? Have published a report on how older people engage with social care system. NHS Long term Plan (2019) New consensus on early detection and intervention with sarcopenia Talking about dying: How to begin honest conversations about what lies ahead - The Royal College of Physicians report that looks at healthcare professionals reasons for difficulty discussing this subject. Useful links and Resources Silver Book (2012) Quality care for older people with urgent and emergency care needs. Kings Fund emergency care Royal College of Occupational Therapy Publications: ‘Reducing the pressure on Hospitals; A report on the value of Occupational Therapy in England’. ‘Embracing Risk: Enabling Choice’ Guidance for Occupational Therapists. - both available from Occupational Therapy: Improving Lives, Saving Money Links related to Leadership We feel that working at any grade and/or leading an occupational therapy team in A&E and acute care requires strong leadership, due to the fast-pace environment. These links will provide more information and resources for clinical leaders in the NHS. Leadership Project at Kings Fund. National Leadership Council. National AHP Leadership Challenge Toolkit. The Career Development Framework: Guiding Principles for Occupational Therapy. Occupational therapy in Emergency Departments and Acute Medicine - related articles Bissett, M. (2011). 'Occupational therapy in the emergency department: perceptions of medical staff...Occupational Therapy Australia, 24th National Conference and Exhibition, 29 June - 1 July 2011', Australian Occupational Therapy Journal, 58 pp.20-20. Currie, J. and Crouch, R. (2008). 'How far is too far? Exploring the perceptions of the professions on their current and future roles in emergency care', Emergency medicine journal, 25 (6), pp.335-339. Cusick, A., Johnson, L. and Bissett, M. (2010). 'Continuing professional development for occupational therapy emergency department services', Australian Occupational Therapy Journal, 57 (6), p.380-385. Cusick, A., Johnson, L. and Bissett, M. (2009). 'Occupational therapy in emergency departments: Australian practice', Journal of evaluation in clinical practice, 15 (2), pp.257-265. Carlill G, Gash E, Hawkins G (2002). 'Preventing Unnecessary Hospital Admissions: an Occupational Therapy and Social Work Service in an Accident and Emergency Department', The British Journal of Occupational Therapy, 65 (10), pp.440-445. Clarke C, Stack C, Martin M (2018) Lack of meaningful activity on acute physical hospital wards: Older peoples experiences. British Journal of Occupational Therapy 81(1) 15-23. Davies N and Simelane B (2017) The impact for seven-day working for patients and staff in an acute physical older adult’s unit: A service evaluation. British Journal of Occupational Therapy 80(11) 689-693. Hendriksen, H. and Harrison, R.A. (2001). 'Occupational therapy in accident and emergency departments: a randomized controlled trial', Journal of advanced nursing, 36 (6), pp.727-732. Hoskins, R. (2011). 'Evaluating new roles within emergency care: a literature review', International emergency nursing, 19 (3), pp.125-140. James, K., Jones, D., Kempenaar, L., Preston, J. and Kerr, S. (2016). Occupational therapy and emergency departments: A critical review of the literature. British Journal of Occupational Therapy, Aug 2016, 79, pp.459-466. James et al (2017) Occupational Therapists in Emergency Departments: A qualitative study. British Journal of Occupational Therapy 81(3) 154-161 Preston et al (2018) Occupational Therapists and Paramedics form a mutually beneficial alliance to reduce the pressure on hospitals: A practice analysis. British Journal of Occupational Therapy 81(6) 358-662 Price, S. (2012). 'Role of an occupational therapy technician in A&E department', British Journal of Healthcare Assistants, 6 (12), pp.608-611. Spang, L. (2015). 'Occupational therapy practice in emergency care: Occupational therapists' perspectives', Scandinavian journal of occupational therapy, 22 (5), pp.345; 345-354 10p; 354 10p. White, L. and Compton, C. (2013). 'An exploration of the effectiveness of the occupational therapy role in emergency medicine', British Journal of Occupational Therapy, 76 pp.103-104. Updated December 2020. Clinical Forum: Care Home NetworkThe Care Home Clinical Forum is open to members who have an interest in, or work with individuals living in residential or nursing homes. There are an estismated 4,699 nursing homes and 6,023 residential homes without nursing in the UK and according to the latest LaingBuisson survey, there are 421,100 people aged 65+ in residential care (including with nursing) [1]. Occupational therapy has huge potential to improve the wellbeing of residents in care homes, through rehabilitation, complex care planning, positive risk management, meaningful activity provision and assessment for adaptive equipment. Whether you are working within a care home or providing support to care homes you are very welcome to join the forum. Please contact (ssopenquiries@gmail.com) if you have any queries about care homes or anything you would like us to address in the Forum. Many of us work in isolation, but we hope to use the forum to network, share best practice and seek expert advice. Please update your details to request the addition of RCOTSSOP care homes clinical forum to your profile, should you wish to receive emails and updates relating to residential and nursing care. Remember - there is no limit on the number of forums to join within the RCOTSSOP. Forum Leads Linda Parry and Anna McVeigh ssopenquiries@gmail.com With over fifteen years experience working with older people in acute, community and care settings, I have a good understanding about the issues affecting this growing population. I currently work as a Care & Dementia Advisor for a large not-for-profit care home provider, supporting homes to make improvements in their care for residents with complex needs. I strongly believe that occupational therapy is invaluable in improving the lives of residents in care homes, and yet it is often an undervalued and underfunded resource. Those of us who are fortunate enough to work in this setting often work in isolation and it is my hope that through the forum we can support each other in exchanging ideas, airing frustrations, and sharing good practice. Co-lead - currently vacant We are looking for a co-lead to enable the forum to be as useful as possible to members. Would anyone like to volunteer for this role? It is a great CPD opportunity, and experience is not required. Please contact Susie. Contribute to our forum The forums are run by volunteers in their own time. Most of the co-leads have busy clinical jobs too and need all members to play a role in sharing and driving forward good practice so we really appreciate any input from forum members. Are you developing anything interesting in your area? Are there any local initiatives that may be of interest to others? We would like to hear what our members are doing to support residents in care homes. Have you attended any interesting study days or read anything interesting about care homes? We would like you to share your learning experiences. Do you have any ideas or suggestions for the Care Homes Forum? Tweet - Like us and tweet @COTSS_OP Perhaps consider tweeting about key issues or areas of good practice within this specialty [1] Age UK 2018 Clinical Forum: FallsThe Falls Clinical Forum is open to members who work with individuals at risk of falling, have already fallen or therapists that have an interest in Falls Prevention and Management. The forum aims to share and disseminate good evidence based practice in the area of Falls Prevention and Management, aspiring to engage members in local and national initiatives. Falls Forum Lead – Vacant Falls Forum Co-Lead – Marianne Elliott Contact via ssopenquiries@gmail.com Bio coming soon Falls Forum Co-Lead – Jessica Aka Contact via ssopenquiries@gmail.com Bio coming soon Falls Forum Co-Lead – Jenny Cooper Bio coming soon Falls Forum Membership The falls forum welcomes all members who work in the area of, or have an interest in, falls prevention and management. There are over 400 risk factors for falling, which makes this area of practice complex and challenging. The aim of the forum is to share information and best practice relating to falls prevention and management. It is also a place to ask questions, build networks and learn from each other. We aim to share information relating to national events and study events along with falls related information from RCOT. The success of the forum depends on the active contribution of all members, the more we engage and share with each other the more we will learn and develop the profession and the services we offer. You can contribute in a variety of ways; Are you working on any projects that relate to falls prevention and management for older people? Would you like to share your experiences or learning with the forum in the newsletter or by hosting a webinar? This is a great way to evidence your CPD! Do you know of any projects or initiatives that would benefit the practice of colleagues? What are your plans for Falls Awareness Week? Did you do something falls focused for OT week? Have you attended any courses relating to falls? Could you share your learning or simply highlight the course so other can attend? Have you read any interesting articles or books, or watched any webinars? Again, share what you have learned, we would love to hear from you. Do you have a question about falls prevention or management? We can send this out to the forum members for advice or we could use this as a topic in one of the monthly webinars. Do you have any research priorities relating to falls? You could tweet about anything falls related using @RCOT_OP. Please do get in touch via ssopenquiries@gmail.com we would love to hear from you! Resources RCOT Practice Guidelines Occupational therapy in the prevention and management of falls in adults NIHR Evidence - NIHR Evidence - Informative and accessible health and care research This website has links to summaries and findings of health and care research. Here are a few to get you started but do check the main site regularly for more recent developments. NIHR Evidence - Long-term exercise programmes reduce falls and injuries in older adults - Informative and accessible health and care research NIHR Evidence - Getting up after a fall: training could encourage older people to get themselves back up - Informative and accessible health and care research NIHR Evidence - Care home residents on multiple medications have an increased risk of falling - Informative and accessible health and care research Clinical Forum: Intermediate Care and ReablementThe Intermediate Care and Reablement Clinical Forum provides an information exchange and support for practitioners working in intermediate care, rapid response, reablement, early supported discharge, discharge to home, and other short term intervention services, in bed-based units and community teams. The clinical forum provides an ongoing resource for the membership of RCOT SS - Older People, and represents the Specialist Section on national developments and policies relating to the above services. We co-ordinate feedback from members as well as disseminating information regarding relevant national initiatives, new developments and clinical practice. The Royal College of Occupational Therapists (2013) Position Statement: Reablement: the added value of Occupational Therapists, states the following: “Across health and social care the terms reablement, enablement, rehabilitation, and intermediate care tend to be used loosely, and the boundaries between the services they refer to are often blurred. Reablement - aims to help people accommodate their illness or condition by learning or relearning the skills necessary for daily living (Care Services Efficiency Delivery Programme, Homecare Re-ablement Work stream 2007). Enablement - to provide someone with adequate power, means, opportunity, or authority (to do something) (HarperCollins 1992). Rehabilitation - A process aiming to restore personal autonomy in those aspects of daily living considered most relevant by patients or service users and their family carers (Sinclair and Dickinson, 1998). Intermediate care - the primary function of intermediate care is to build up people’s confidence to cope once more with day to day activities. It serves as an extension to specialist clinical care and rehabilitation, but not as a substitute for it: quick access to specialist medical and other support when needed is vital (Audit Commission 2000)” Forum Leadership Co-Lead - currently vacant Newsletter Our forum members regularly update the wider older peoples specialist sections with whats happening in their world. You can include this by emailing membership@rcot.co.uk with the article you would like to submit, and we will get back to you in relation to this. You might prefer talking than writing, and that’s great to hear too. We welcome our members involvement with our webinars, either as part of the audience, co-hosting, or hosting a webinar in relation to the work they are doing. Again contact us via membership@rcot.co.uk and we will come back to you to discuss your ideas further and arrange a mutually convenient date/time for your involvement. NICE GUIDELINE 74 – Intermediate Care including Reablement A draft document was published in September 2017 covering referral and assessment for intermediate care, and how to deliver the service. A review of the NICE draft quality standards is currently underway (April 2018) - we now await the final document. NICE Guidance Feb 2018 – People’s experience in adult social care services: improving the experience of care and support for people using adult social care services. Reablement Services in Health and Social Care – a guide to practice for students and support workers by Valerie Ebrahhin and Hazel Chapman. Published by Macmillan Education UK Recent RCOT Guidance and Publications: Embracing Risk: enabling choice – March 2018 Occupational Therapy for people undergoing total hip replacement – 2017 OTHER USEFUL INFORMATION: Social Care Institute for Excellence (2011) At a glance 46: Reablement: a key role for occupational therapists. London: Social Care Institute for Excellence. Royal College of Occupational Therapists Supporting Practice - Evidence and Resources (SPEaR) - Avoiding Unplanned Hospital Admissions - Reablement - Hospital to Home Resource Pack – 2012 “This was produced by a task group initiated by Care & Repair England, supported by England’s Department of Health and the Department for Communities and Local Government. Representatives of COT contributed to the pack's development. Other contributors include the Chartered Institute of Housing, Age UK, Foundations and the Kings Fund” “This Hospital to Home* Resource Pack contains essential information for all the professional sectors that have a role in hospital discharge for older people in England. It contains information, suggestions for action, case studies and checklists for considering older patients’ housing situations in hospital discharge and transfer of care and for improving integration of housing and support into the process for discharging older people.” Relevant RCOT Practice Guidelines Occupational Therapy for People with Parkinson’s Disease Frail and Older People’s care bulletin (monthly) – a regular newsletter for professionals in the London region interested in older people’s care. Provided by Aubrey Keep Library. This has very useful information, and is not just relevant to London.
