Why I Want To Be An Occupational Therapist Essay

I am Cristen Sudduth, a native of Jackson, MS. Throughout my life, I have observed and encountered several accounts of resilience. Including times when my siblings and I would hurt ourselves by playing our various sports a little too rough which led to temporarily altering our daily lifestyle. These experiences allotted us the opportunity to build through some form of therapeutic exercises. Each exercise helped us gain the courage, confidence and physical strength we needed to return to our regularly life that we normally had and enjoyed so much. That’s where I believe my passion to become an occupational therapist began.

Occupational Therapy Assistants are professionals who make a difference in the lives of people who have difficulty performing work and daily activities to do an illness, injury and disability. It’s a growing career that is in great in demand. The salary depends on several factors but for the most part it’s rewarding. The requirements to become an Occupational Therapy Assistant is for one to receive their associate’s degree from an accredited school and pass the National Board Exam.

My placement was at Toronto Rehab at the Lyndhurst location. I was placed in a seating clinic to work with neurological clients who either have a spinal cord injury, spina bifida, polio or general decline in function regarding their posture. I was assigned to work with Andree Gauthier; she has twelve years of experience when it comes to wheelchair seating and positioning. My placement started from March 6 to April 7 and my work hours are 8:30am to 4:30pm. From my previous intermediate placement, I had the opportunity to do an inventory of all mobility aides residents use at the LTC home. I was able to utilize my previous knowledge and applied my skills in the seating clinic. At the seating clinic, they provide wheelchair seating assessments for custom made backrest and cushion for the clients. Clients may also require specialized drive controls or have chronic postural and skin issues where past interventions have been unsuccessful. I had the opportunity to experience many learning opportunities at the seating clinic that will help me in my future practice as a health care professional.

Thank you for taking the time to meet with me. I am the student liaison to the American Occupational Therapy Association, (AOTA), for the University of the Sciences in Philadelphia. I also am an active voter and representative of your Delaware constituency as I have lived in Delaware my entire life. In fact, I was on the Brandywine YMCA swim team with your son, Christopher. My time spent at the YMCA of Delaware peaked my interests to work with special need’s populations, leading me to the track of becoming an occupational therapist. Occupational therapy is an arcane profession to the general populous. Occupational therapists help all individuals live life to their fullest by maximizing one’s level of independence through engaging

Occupational Therapy is a profession primarily centred around client-therapist interactions. The main objective of an occupational therapist (OT) is to empower and assist their clients in their return to everyday life and activities. Occupational therapists work with their clients for extended periods of time in order to ensure that they are able to participate in their normal daily routines with some degree of ease. OT's achieve this goal through building trust and rapport with their clients by representing themselves with the highest degree of professional identity and following the codes of conduct, to which ensures safety to all involved in the achievement of this goal. As occupational therapists work closely with a number of different

Occupational therapy allows a patient to work towards the goal of being able to perform basic everyday functional tasks. Therapy will differ for each patient, providing purposeful tasks that will allow the most growth for the specific individual needs. Being able to be an independent individual that can perform functional tasks is something that most people strive for, and if something happened that altered this way of life, it can be very stressful and even feel dehumanizing to the patient. Striving for independence and working with the therapists is something that will positively affect the patient's quality of life.

Occupational therapy saved my family. Growing up with a sister with severe spastic cerebral palsy to include both cognitive and functional deficits, life existed on a day to day, hour by hour basis, as we were unsure of challenges each moment would bring. This all changed the moment occupational therapy brought quality of life back to me and my family. My very personal experience defined my purpose to become an occupational therapist, to pay the gift given my family forward.

Occupation is the Word that defines the occupational therapy profession, and it can use it for both ways occupation as a process or occupation as end or goals. Maybe that it will be confusing for personnel outside the profession and that’s why we need to educate and explain it every day. As clinicians, we need to clarify it in patient goals and daily documentations. Also, as managers, we need to promote our profession with occupations and their meaning for our clients. When we use occupation as a goal is simpler to everyone else accept their obvious meaning. But when we use the occupations as the process we helped patients to engage in the occupations to improve every step they need to reach their own goals in occupations that define their

Becoming an occupational therapist is my passion and my long-term career goal. Since a young age I have been incredibly inspired and motivated to befriend and help disabled individuals. Having grown up with a disabled mother who benefited from the services of occupational therapy I had the opportunity to see first hand how the experience gave can give individuals like her fulfilling and productive lives. With both parents working as healthcare professionals, including my mother who is now an occupational therapist herself, I see every day how rewarding the field is. Through my life I have had unique personal, professional and educational experiences that have shaped me into a strong candidate for an advanced education in occupational therapy.

It seems like yesterday when I was in high school trying to figure out what I wanted to do with my future. When I thought about the career I would want to pursue I was having trouble picturing myself in the type of work I would be most satisfied in. Around this same time, I suffered a sports injury and had to receive physical therapy in order to heal. This is what initially got me interested in working in rehab. This, I’m sure, is the way many young people become interested in physical therapy. It clicked for me because a physical therapist was the first career I could picture myself as, no other career choice I could so easily see myself doing. So, after I had this revelation I started to pursue higher education in the health sciences and tried to become more familiar with the rehab environment.

First of all, I feel as if I am a very dedicated person, whether it’s related to my educational goals, current job or career goals, or personal relationships. I take dedication seriously because I believe dedication shows you truly care about that goal you are trying to attain or that person of which you are trying to maintain a good, lasting relationship.

Occupational therapy is a health profession dedicated to supporting people in living their lives with meaning

The place I decided to carry out my job shadowing experience is at Select Physical Therapy. During my time there, I decided to shadow an Occupational therapist who specialized in hand therapy. I wanted to shadow an Occupational Therapist because at the time, I was interested in becoming an Occupational Therapist and I wanted to see if this is really the career path I wanted to take.

I am taking college classes in hopes of obtaining a desired career in the future. In order for me to pursue my dreams of becoming a physical therapist, I need to complete the required college classes in order to get into medical school. Once I have completed medical school, I need to complete other requirements to become a certified physical therapist. Obtaining this career would not be possible unless I started out with taking college classes. Along with the hopes of being a physical therapist, I am also taking college classes for financial reasons. Even though a college education does require money, I am more likely to earn a higher salary job with an education than without one. I want to be able to support myself and a possible family in the

Health and social care is something that I have always been passionate about. Because I have studied health and social care for the last four years I have regularly met a lot of the most vulnerable members of society through past work experiences. Through past placements I have worked with children who have special needs. This helped me develop ways of communicating with the children this could be through sign language. Because my Aunt is deaf I have taught myself basic sign language in order to communicate with her effectively. This helped me a lot while I was involved in working with the children in the special needs school. Working within this environment has helped me gain a lot of confidence in myself this is because, it has proved to me that I can