I have a child that I work with in a school setting (2nd grade, primary diagnosis of autism). She is incredibly smart and during the previous school year I made great progress with her in terms of self-regulation, scissor skills, handwriting, etc. However since the start from the summer session, she has been extremely fixated on using YouTube on her device. Long story short, between the end of the school year and the beginning of the summer session, her mother gave her access to YouTube on her AAC device and since then she gets extremely upset and demonstrates self injurious behaviors since we've blocked YouTube on her device.

Speech has also said that since this girl is capable of writing what she wants on a whiteboard, she no longer uses the device in the classroom. She can no longer come to the therapy room without these types of behaviors and she no longer enjoys any of the analog toys or games that she used fo play. Her sessions now are pretty much her crying or trying to hit herself while i try to help her self-regulate, with brief moments where im able to have to complete some activities. Has anyone encountered these types of situations and has advice? Im lost on what to do.

Edit: to give you an idea of the rapid behavior change: In the last week she's punched me in the face, tried to spit on me, and tried to bite me multiple times. In the 1.5 years ive worked with this student, she's never done that to me before.

My new clinic primarily uses the PDMS-3 for our younger kiddos. This is the first time I’ve had to rely on the Peabody and I absolutely hate it.

I feel like the testing items jump around so much and I have to keep flipping back and forth between subtests in order to not have to take certain materials out randomly 7 different times. Plus the instructions are so long and weird. Most kids I’m testing can’t follow one step directions let alone “ with my palm down I put the short end of this string between my thumb and index finger. I take the long end over my index finger, etc, etc” 🙄

This assessment just has absolutely no flow in my opinion, and it makes my evaluations feel really chaotic.

I’m thinking I have to make my own cheat sheet to get through this assessment because the booklet itself stresses me out.

Any tips?

I have been working for nearly 20 years and have seen a lot with FW students but have always been able to support them through to pass. this past summer I have had one that has struggled from day one but we have worked hard together and she has made a lot of improvement. she is in week 11 and presenting her final inservice tomorrow. she had only sent me an outline prior which was fine but once I received the final presentation it was so clearly AI generate. it had all the tells of a lot of language and jargon but no real meaning. the use of triads of phrases. her sources did not make sense and were very rarely related to what she is discussing on her slides. none of them were even from AJOT. I have now contacted her coordinator again regarding this but have yet to hear back. this is a big part of her grade so I can concretely see her level of understanding of utilizing FOR and theory. (outpatient peds sensory clinic) the parameters of the project and presentation were outlined clearly in week 3 and she has had plenty of time to discuss any issues with me. My instinct is to fail her once I speak to the coordinator but am I over reacting??? I absolutely hate the use of AI in healthcare and have seen so many therapists lose skills by relying on it.

Nurses are in demand. Everyone knows what a nurse is

I decided to venture into a career in healthcare because I like helping people and was studying science all the way. I looked at SIT courses and didnt really have a string interest in anything and based on elimination I chose Occupational Therapy and Diagnostic Radiography. I felt that the meaning of OT was quite meaningful like helping others gain back their independence and got offered Occupational Therapy. But then I felt that in reality it would prob be very different and the persona of patients would prob mainly be elderlies and people with special needs (SPED I think I'm not suitable).

I went shadowing for both types of allied health and I didnt find one that I was super passionate in but if I were to choose between one, diagnostic radiography looks more interesting to me as you can learn how to interpret the images and "diagnose" (for myself to learn not to tell the patients cuz its not legal to do so). And for OT I felt that when u r working in the same place at the same level, most of the patients have the same issue and the solution and exercise u give them is lowkey the same which felt super repetitive.

Im really lost on what to do right now. Because I also got a SIT Scholarship. And they said I cant switch courses, if I wanted I have to reapply next year, and that would mean I need to reapply for Scholarship which is uncertain whether I would get. Im really lost and worried about finances like what if I reapply and dont get Scholarship. Is DR something I super duper want or is it just like cuz idw OT u get what I mean? If its the 2nd one, then is it worth wasting 1 year and the chance of not getting a Scholarship. 😭😭😭

Hi guys, so the past couple of weeks I’ve been really looking into COTA and OTA in general. I have experience working with children and I’m Neurodiverse myself and I would love to help other Neurodiverse children learn to navigate the world through different OT interventions. Additionally, I would also love to help working in OT in mental health because it’s also something that I have lived experience in. I have a big plan and I’m trying to figure out this career change but my main question is is the money worth it in NJ or NYC ? For reference I’m able to keep rent down to 1200 and be happy usually?
Do you think I can find enough jobs in COTA or mental health upon graduation?

Tell me about your experience! Feel free to private message me! ​

now I don’t mean to sound too dramatic because it was (so far) only one day for one extra session / an extra half hour, but still.

So i’m a COTA and I work for a small, privately owned Outpatient pediatric clinic where my boss / the owner is the other OT. There’s only 3 OT practitioners that work for us: me being one of them (a COTA), my boss, and one more super part time OT. I’m the only one who sees OT for after school hours and I usually work like a 9-4:30 or 5:30.

When the end of school comes around, my boss puts out a notice for any families who want to change their spot for summertime to a different time a day. She puts the disclaimer however, that if you choose to give up your time slot (like an after school slot) for a morning spot for summer, there’s no guarantee you’ll get that spot back come fall time again.

Well, I had a client who switched to an earlier time for the summer primarily so he could get speech back to back (since a lot of our SLPs also don’t do after school hours and spots are limited). To be expected, that client’s after school spot that they left got filled by someone else, so now there was no room for them.

So INSTEAD of following her OWN RULE AND DISCLAIMER, what do I notice that my boss does? She goes into our schedule and extends one of my days (primarily ending at 4:30 but that she then changed to end at 5) in order to fit that client in back on my schedule.

This is a client that’s been coming for quite some time and I understand you don’t wanna lose them. And yes, it’s a client who I like and whose family I like. But that doesn’t mean I should have to take the consequence of my schedule being extended WITHOUT MY CONSENT ??? in order to accommodate them!

Im not mad at the family, I’m angry at my boss. I’m mad for 2 reasons:

1.) Where she’s wanting to put this client on my schedule, that makes 6 back to back sessions for me with no break. Granted, they’re only 30 min each and maybe some people find that a piece of cake, but I don’t operate that way as a therapist. What angers me is my boss KNOWS this. About a year or so ago I had a total breakdown to her. I let it all out and sobbed about how stressed and burnt out I am and I spent day after day hiding in the bathroom to cry between clients when I had the time. Since then, I’ve even put blocks into my schedule to serve as a separate break from my lunch to break between clients so I’m not seeing 6-7-8+ in a row with no break.

2.) I understand it’s only a 30 min add on and shouldn’t be the end of the world, but it’s the PRINCIPLE in my eyes. It’s the fact that you went and changed MY schedule without consulting me or even LETTING ME KNOW. I find it extremely disrespectful and I feel like I just keep getting taken advantage of. Being a COTA, not being the owner of the place, being the only OT who’s a little more full time, being the only one to work the after school hours because there’s no one else, being the one to take on clients from my boss’s caseload because she wants to practice less.

I truly am so angry and idk what to do. I’ll probably end up sucking it up and keeping him on, but I think at the LEAST I need to advocate for him to go on a different day so I’m not stuck with the same burnout of having so many kids in a row to the point where I can’t even function at work.

I’m just at a loss for words. I expect this from a DOR or upper management people who don’t get what it’s like to be in the therapy department, but not from my boss who’s an OTR and I thought would have more of a heart than to do this to me.

Hello 👋 I am a first year MSOT student and currently learning about life skills for young adults in special education, group homes, etc. I’m really interested and can see this as a potential career path for myself. I’ve already worked in peds population for abt 7 years but mostly preschool / elementary age. I was wondering how common of an area this actually is in OT. Does anyone practice primarily with young adults on life skills? Or have any experience in this realm, and can tell me what it is like day to day. Thank you!

I just graduated OT school, and if I'm being honest, I'm feeling really anxious about what's next. My Level II fieldwork placement wasn't a great experience, and instead of feeling excited to start my career, I feel like I've lost a lot of the confidence and excitement I had going into it. On top of that, my social media feeds are filled with OTs talking about low pay, burnout, productivity demands, and leaving the profession altogether. I know social media often highlights the negatives, but it's hard not to let it get to me. Now I'm sitting here wondering if I made the right career choice or if I should have gone down a different path. After years of school, that's a pretty scary feeling to have.

I'd really love to hear from OTs who have been where I am. Does it get better once you find the right job? Is there still a place in this profession where you can enjoy what you do without burning out? I could really use some honest perspectives right now.

Hi everyone,

I'm considering completing a masters in OT in Canada, and I was curious if anyone had some experience on being an OT in the middle east? I hope to move there in the next couple years, so if anyone has info on:

- what the job market is like

- OT settings in demand

- salary and job progression

I'd greatly appreciate it!

Hi everyone,

I'm hoping to hear from people who have been in a similar situation.

I completed a double degree for my undergraduate studies, and my WAM is around 66, so I know it's not competitive for many Australian Master of Occupational Therapy programs. I've been really stressed about this, but I'm genuinely passionate about becoming an OT, so I'm doing everything I can to strengthen my application.

I'm currently completing a Graduate Diploma in Public Health, and my goal is to achieve a much stronger GPA. After that, I plan to reapply for Master of OT programs.

I'm wondering:

1. Has anyone been accepted into a Master of OT program after improving their academic record through a Graduate Diploma or Graduate Certificate?

2. Did the universities take your postgraduate grades into account, or did they mainly focus on your undergraduate GPA?

3. Which universities accepted you?

I'd really appreciate hearing about your experiences or any advice you may have.

Thank you so much!

What do we think about it? I have a hard time getting past the lack of evidence but have a new OT onboard who swears it was one of the most effective things she did at her last clinic and she saw great gains with a hands on, manual therapy approach working with both peds and adult populations with little need for an HEP

Curious if anyone has/hasn’t seen results?

I got a kiddo who has been signed up for OT due to sensory and clothing intolerance my books said. Except I found out its all perennial sensitivity, and I can hardly bring out the Wilbarger brushes or the vibrating sloth pillow I use for more generalized clothing intolerance.

Talking to the parents too, while clothing sensory is how they understand the concept, its pretty clear that kiddo is moreso just wholeheartedly rejecting the concept of having a period at all. Cognition is typical but we become so dysregulated that we can't wear sanitary solutions, we can't go to school and we just cry on and off and try to sit on towels around the house for a few days. Parents need a solution by fall

All the resources I'm coming across are "let the child hold a pad and draw on it! learn a schedule!" but thats way to advanced for the levels of dysregulation occuring here. I think kiddo understands I think they're just rejecting.

I haven't handled a period situation with a child before, any advice from those that might have?

edit: because I forgot to mention, kiddo is on spectrum but largely IND and with typical cognition. Just having a really strong trauma response to the body changing without permission

Hello,

I am an Occupational Therapy student at CBD College. My group is collecting data for our research paper. If you have ever been a caregiver to a person living with dementia, please consider taking our survey.

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSd7YR3R8LtIIPMn-bySO2WKGxCMcW6Sa7LHZq7OCaXbfX1qBw/viewform

Acute care OT here -

My partner is a teacher and dreams of us having holidays and summers off together.

The issue is, I absolutely love my job in acute care. Despite this the allure of having similar schedules, especially with children in the future, sounds really ideal.

I don’t often see anyone posting positively about being a school OT on this thread. As the title mentions, wondering if anyone here has had a positive experience with being a school OT? If there are negatives, do you feel the schedule or any other perks make up for it?

Edit to add: thank you all so much for the great insight!!! This makes me excited about the option in the future, and shoutout to all the school OTs - thanks for all you do

If you're lucky enough to have one. Mine is a concrete storage closet, so one wall is all cabinets and the other two are cream colored cinder blocks. It's a weird triangle shaped room. Just curious if you choose to decorate or keep it simple to not overwhelm/distract.

I’m applying to OT programs in TX (TWU, USAHS, Tarleton, and UT Tyler, etc.) and was wondering how many observation/shadowing hours everyone applied with.

Right now I have:
64 hours in an outpatient pediatric clinic
17 hours in a skilled nursing facility (SNF)
I also work as a Therapy tech in an inpatient rehabilitation hospital, so I have ongoing patient care experience there.
How many OT observation hours did you apply with? Did you have experience in multiple settings? If you got accepted, I'd love to hear what your hours and experiences looked like so I can compare where I'm at.

Thanks!

I’m working on finding a therapists but am making this post to see which kind of specialist I need and if I’m headed in the right direction.

I’m 26 and I’ve had lifelong left-sided instability. My left hip is noticeably weaker, my left foot rotates differently, I have difficulty balancing on that leg, and recently I’ve noticed my left foot dragging or tilted down when I walk. I’ve also noticed that on my groin I have significantly less muscle. It’s like my right side has take over lol since my left isn’t working well?

Can occupational therapy help with this?

Is the personal statement not suppose to be about OT at all. I wrote mine kinda about myself but tied it into why OT.

Im wondering because many of the schools I am applying for want a “why OT” essay?

In mental health such as psychiatry, counselling, the older generation, some cultures have a stigma on receiving mental health counselling. Do patients have a stigma about this if they receive occupational therapy in mental health?

Hi friends

I'm a COTA, I graduated in May of 2025. I worked full time in outpatient peds for ~8 months but quit due to a hostile work environment and having too many cancellations which resulted in me not getting enough hours. Then I started PRN at an inpatient acute rehab facility, which I'm still at and I love it but they typically only have PRN shifts available 3-4 times a month. I'm also working part-time at a company that contracts out of senior living facilities to provide therapy to the residents there, but I'm having problems getting enough hours again bc of so many refusals. Reasons vary from being sick, having other appointments, or just not wanting to miss bingo (lol).

I've talked to my boss and coworkers about this and they tell me to just work on building relationships and re-frame therapy as just "going for a walk" or "playing a game". But the residents see right through it and I'm starting to think I just don't have the right personality for this. Maybe for this setting, maybe for this field.

I'm planning on moving from MO to TX in about 16 months, and I didn't want to change jobs again bc I don't want to look unreliable. But I'm not working enough to be able to pay my bills and save up and at this point I feel like I'm wasting my gas and my time to just get nothing but refusals or maybe 1-2 hours a day when it should've been 8 hours. I asked the hospital I PRN at to let me know if they have any full or part time positions open up but they don't have anything atm.

Does anyone have any recs for settings that will be more consistent or any advice for how to make my current situation better? I don't want to work with kids again but some of my former classmates keep recommending the school districts. :/

TIA!

Hi everyone!

I'm a backend software developer looking to build software that solves a real problem for people in this community.

Instead of guessing what people need, I'd rather hear directly from the people who deal with these challenges every day.

What's one repetitive, frustrating, or time-consuming part of your work that you think could realistically be improved with software?

If you're willing, it would really help if you could include:

• What is the task?
• How often do you do it?
• How do you currently handle it? (Paper, Excel, WhatsApp, another app, etc.)
• What's the most frustrating part?
• Have you tried any existing software? If so, what was missing?
• If a tool solved this well, would you actually use it? If not, why?

If I notice the same problem being mentioned by a lot of people, I'll build an MVP around it and share an early version with this community first so you can try it and give feedback before it's released more broadly.

Thanks in advance! My goal is to learn from the people who actually do the work and build something genuinely useful—not just another app looking for users.