British Journal of Occupational Therapy

The hospital environment can exacerbate symptoms of delirium; as such there is a move to promote early supported discharge for patients with delirium. However, the occupational therapy role and impact of intervention is not well known. Our study evaluated an occupational therapy delirium pathway facilitating early assessment, intervention and supported discharge to home compared with hospital-based care.

A before and after, observational study design. Data was collected regarding hospital use, patient function (Functional Independence Measure/Functional Assessment Measure) and the carer experience (Preparedness for Caregiving Scale).

Ninety patients (43 control and 47 intervention group patients) were recruited with a mean patient age of 82.8 years (SD 7.6). There was a significant difference in hospital re-presentations (n = 3 in the intervention group compared to n = 10 in the control group (p = 0.026)). Hospital length of stay did not significantly differ between the groups (p = 0.534). The mean score for the Preparedness for Caregiving Scale was 3.3 indicating that most carers felt ‘pretty well prepared’. However, patients continued to experience significant functional decline (p = 0.006).

An occupational therapy delirium pathway reduced hospital re-presentations and could be implemented in clinical practice to better support patients recovering from delirium as they transition from hospital to home.

This research examines how close family members consider themselves to contribute to the activities, routines and occupational identity of their elderly relatives with dementia who reside in long-term residential care, and the factors that support or challenge their involvement.

Five participants engaged in a single semi-structured interview, which were analysed utilising interpretative phenomenological analysis.

Close family members contributed to their relatives’ occupational experiences by being vigilant and advocating to rectify perceived deficits in care home staff’s provision of activity; providing their relatives with personalised, hands-on support to access more frequent and higher-quality opportunities for occupational participation and engagement; and maintaining their relatives’ occupational identity.

Close family members promote frequent opportunities for meaningful occupational participation and engagement for their relatives, and potentially mitigate the extent of occupational injustice that their relatives experience. Accordingly, health and social care staff should enhance close family members’ efforts by developing constructive partnerships with close family members and providing close family members with caregiver training.

People with Learning disabilities (LD) are marginalised within society and experience reduced occupational participation compared to the general population. Research exploring the lived experiences of adults with LD is limited. Gardening has a long history as an Occupational Therapy (OT) intervention with evidence of its benefits for well-being. Yet, previous work with adults with LD has focused on the perspective of the practitioner and has failed to address participant experience. This study aimed to understand the lived experiences of people with LD taking part in a gardening group.

Adults with LD, participating in a charity-run gardening group were recruited to a qualitative, phenomenological study. With consent, participants engaged in a semi-structured interview exploring their experiences of being a member of the gardening group. Thematic analysis was utilised to interpret the results.

Seven interviews were completed. Four main themes indicated that the gardening group helped aid relaxation, provided sense of achievement, developed practical and social skills, and was a lifeline to make friendships.

OTs should utilise these findings to inform practice and reduce occupation deprivation. Future research should explore how environment, activities and participation time, impact the occupation of gardening for adults with a LD.

Delayed professional identity of occupational therapists inhibits successful transition from student to professional. One of the objectives of development of the Community–Academia Student Tutoring (CAST) program is to encourage professional identity formation among first-year undergraduate occupational therapy students. It focuses on developing competence in communication and professional knowledge through a learning-community setting while interacting with individuals with disabilities, thus enhancing students’ self-reflection abilities.

Mixed-method design assessing change before and after participation among 193 students, in competence components essential for professional identity, and factors supporting its formation. Open-ended questions assessed the students’ perceived contribution of the CAST program.

Significantly higher competence in knowledge about people with disabilities and relating to them; increased sense of belonging to a learning community and self-reflection abilities compared to before. Relationship with a person with disability and belonging to a learning community predicted 25.4% of the variance in perceptions of program contribution. Central in the students’ experience were development of self-reflection abilities and interpersonal relationship skills, and learning occupational-therapy concepts through meeting people with disabilities.

First-hand relationships with people with disability and self-reflection in a structured learning-community setting, may help develop first-year students’ communication skills and their professional identity as occupational therapists.

Psychiatric day-care services play a central role in community-based care in Japan. Recovery and related psychosocial factors are critical in promoting community participation of people with mental illness. This study aimed to reveal the relationships among activity information, personal recovery, and related psychosocial factors in day-care users.

Forty day-care participants answered self-report questionnaires. The following assessments were applied: Recovery Assessment Scale, Occupational Questionnaire, Perceived Devaluation Discrimination Scale, and 26-item version of World Health Organization Quality of Life (QOL). The correlations among the factors were analyzed.

Data for 35 people were analyzed. Total recovery score was strongly correlated with total WHOQOL-26 score (r = 0.76, p < 0.001). Total QOL score was positively related with the value of activities (r = 0.46, p < 0.05). Social QOL and total stigma score had a significant negative relationship (r = −0.44, p < 0.05).

Participation in activities was suggested to improve QOL. Although there was a strong relationship between recovery and QOL, it was unclear to what extent participation in activities was related to recovery. We should consider approaches regarding other factors to fully accomplish community integration and personal recovery.