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Rehabilitation

Rehabilitation is the provision of personalised support to help people manage and recover from periods of physical and mental ill-health.  

Occupational therapists working in rehabilitation teams support people to regain and maintain participation in the occupations (day to day activities) that matter to them.

This includes supporting people to manage long-term health conditions and disabilities in the community, as well as providing specialist input to people needing rehabilitation within hospital settings.

Occupational therapists consider people in the context of their physical and social environments and help them identify solutions that reduce or remove barriers to participation in their homes and communities.

They work with people to set goals that are meaningful to them. This will be different for everyone, but could include participation and independence in:

  • Self-care tasks such as washing, dressing and personal grooming
  • Productive tasks such as participating in work and education, care giving and shopping
  • Leisure activities such as hobbies, exercise, socialising and community groups.

Promoting rehabilitation

Across the UK, there is significant variation and inequality in the way that rehabilitation services are commissioned and delivered. There is also a lack of robust data being collected on the long-term outcomes of rehabilitation interventions.

As the only profession to practice across physical and mental health with a focus on people’s everyday activities, occupational therapists are vital in enabling people to live as independently as possible. To ensure that everyone who would benefit from rehabilitation receives it, occupational therapy within rehabilitation services must be fully staffed and resourced.

What we’re doing

We’re meeting with politicians and health leaders and working with alliances and coalitions in all four UK nations, calling for fair access to high quality, person-centred rehabilitation for everyone who needs it. Our shared priorities are:

  • To gain political commitment to delivering universal access to rehabilitation to meet needs
  • To improve the quality of rehabilitation through new models, better data collection, planning, commissioning and delivery of services.

What you can do

We want to know how RCOT members are working to improve the way that rehabilitation is delivered in their local areas. Share your experiences with our Innovation Hub.

Join our leadership forum to tell us about current and future workforce needs and discuss how we can support you and future leaders.

Community rehabilitation best practice standards

We’ve worked as members of the Community Rehabilitation Alliance to develop a set of Community Rehabilitation Best Practice Standards.

These multi-condition, multi-professional standards aim to help community rehabilitation services deliver high-quality, evidence-based interventions. They seek to decrease the local and national variation that currently exists in the delivery of rehabilitation.  

The Community Rehabilitation Alliance is a collective of over 50 charities, trade unions and professional bodies calling on all political parties to ensure there is equitable access to high-quality community rehabilitation services for all. We’re working to ensure that rehabilitation is recognised as a top priority for the health and care system, and to create resources that support health professionals to deliver effective rehabilitation services.