Close

Our Blog

by

Emergency Preparedness

Julie Entwistle, MBA, BHSc (OT), BSc (Health / Gerontology)

The storm in Toronto last week hit hard and fast.  The flooding in Calgary was severe.   Parts of Barrie were leveled many years ago from a tornado.  In 2004 some of Ontario suffered a power outage that lasted for days in the heat of summer.  A few winters ago there was a significant snow storm in London and Sarnia that trapped people in their cars for hours and even overnight.  Ontario and Quebec have also suffered from severe ice storms that have caused power outages in the coldest and darkest days of winter.

While I don’t like to be “doom and gloom”, I do believe in being prepared for an emergency.  I have three kits I keep in my car.  One for the car (jumper cables etc), one for first aid, and one for us should we be stranded.  When we take our kids into busy public places we take a photo of them on our phone so that we know what they are wearing when we arrived (flashback to my panicked parenting moment when we lost a twin for 45 minutes at an amusement park and could not remember what she was wearing to tell the paramedics and police).  In the “olden days” (okay, 8 years ago) we would carry walkie-talkies with us when out with our kids so we could easily communicate about which parent had which kids (flashback to the time when my husband was frantically looking for a kid who was with me the entire time).  Now, we use our cells for this.  Our pool is separately fenced from our already fenced yard and when our kids were small we had safety locks on all the doors to prevent them from leaving the house independently.  The list goes on…

I recently finished a course in Risk Management.  In this, students had to consider the many risks that face an organization, prioritize how significant those risks are to the business should they happen, and determine ways to protect a business from these, or how they should react to “stop the bleeding” following.

The same risk management process can be applied to us personally – regardless of our situation.  This is especially important for persons with disabilities who may have special equipment, housing, medical, or dietary needs that reduces the time they can safely tolerate emergency, or their physical or functional ability to react.  To look at your own risk profile consider the following:  What if you become stranded in your car?  Could not find a child?  Suffer a significant power outage?  Hear of a tornado alert?  Need to evacuate your home?  Have a failure in life-sustaining or mobility equipment?

I believe it is valuable time spent, and could be lifesaving, to outline the risks facing you and your family (including your pets) should disaster strike.  Is there anything you can do to prepare for your identified risks ahead of time?  Are there kits you can make or buy for your car, home or work (blankets, food, water, candles, first-aid, etc.)?  Do you have back-up options if you cannot heat your home, cool your home, store or prepare food for several days?  What if you have special equipment and if this fails do you have battery options, other non-power devices to use, or an emergency response number to call?

Like many things, perhaps an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.  Not to mention the fact that panicking in an emergency situation is rarely the right response, and having a plan in place for the emergency will reduce the likelihood of you responding poorly, making the situation worse.

by

Weekly Mind Bender

What is unusual about the following words: revive, banana, grammar, voodoo, assess, potato, dresser, uneven?

 

Answer

Take the first letter of each word and place it at the end. It will spell the same word backwards.

by

Still Don’t Get OT? Try This:

My previous post outlined the value of OT and spoke about a recent article that highlighted how OT’s are underutilized, but provide great value in healthcare.  I could not agree more.  And I would hope that anyone that has encountered a good OT would also agree.  One of our biggest challenges as we try to become a “household name” is the fact that people still struggle to understand what we do, and how we do it.  With OT there is no magic formula so we can’t publish the recipe for our secret sauce.  Besides, we don’t see disability in a vacuum where a diagnosis determines the treatment.  Rather, we look at each disability in the context of that person, in that environment, and this makes it impossible to really give people the goods on how we help.  OT then is the definition of healthcare “customization”.  Perhaps you really need to experience an OT to understand and appreciate the scope of what we do.

However, I always love spreading creative and fun ways to explain our profession.  These two You Tube videos are well done, and explain OT in a way that you can’t put on paper.  Take a look, enjoy and hopefully you too will be saying to someone someday “maybe you need an OT”?


by

Reap What You Sow All Summer Long

Thinking of starting your own vegetable garden?  Gardening is a great way to get outside and enjoy nature while reaping many health benefits.  Growing your own food can also be beneficial due to: cost savings, the promotion of eco-friendly activities, allowing you to connect with nature, educational opportunities and many more!  The following article by Readers Digest provides easy tips on how to start your own vegetable garden and reap the benefits your harvest will bring.

Readers Digest: Grow Your Own Fruits, Vegetables and Herbs

by

Does OT Work? Absolutely!

I am not shy about loving my profession.  I think occupational therapy is one of the most creative, compassionate, client-centered and “bang for your buck” health professions as we are trained to help people with a variety of disabilities (physical, cognitive, emotional and behavioral) to function as effectively and independently as possible.  While none of us will claim our profession is “rocket science”, I hope all of us have move passed thinking our knowledge is “common sense”.  As a profession, I feel that we continue to be behind our peers in shouting our skills from the rooftops, and while we have been around for a really long time, I still get asked “oh, so you are a physio”?

I was thrilled to read a recent article in Healthcare Quarterly (Vol. 16 No. 1) on the value of OT.  This article indicates that “occupational therapy interventions are cost-effective in treating or preventing injury and improving outcomes”, and clearly states that “occupational therapists are underused and not working to their full scope of practice” (page 69).  The article further outlines that there are “clear, cost-effective opportunities for occupational therapists to use their expertise and full scope of practice in the areas of:  case management, chronic disease management, injury prevention, caregiver education, intervening at the point of hospitalization or to reduce hospital stays, community or caregiver support to reduce re-hospitalization, rehabilitation and palliative care” (page 71).  In the end, the article concludes that “there is a strong foundation of evidence indicating positive health outcomes in occupational therapy intervention, with good value from an economic perspective” (page 72).

Perhaps, with research and articles such as these, the systems that fund healthcare (public and private alike) can more fully understand why occupational therapists are a necessary part of the rehabilitation continuum and are a cost benefit, not just a cost.  However, in the world of auto insurance, one of our current struggles is getting other members of our own profession to understand this, and to support occupational therapy treatment when an insurer disputes the need.  I hope this article will help other OT’s to feel that evidence does exist to support our worth, and they will join the crusade to advocate for, and support, our profession as a valuable, contributing and essential service in the public and private sectors.  Go OT!

by

Make The Most of Your Weekend

Are you weekends filled with countless errands and projects?  Do you make time for fun activities?  The following article from Readers Digest discusses how you can plan ahead to ensure you and your family get more out of your weekends and give ideas for easy ways to add some fun to your summer.  The activities are fun, strengthen family relationships, and will help keep you and your family active and healthy.

Reader’s Digest: 9 Tips for Active Weekends

by

Want Feedback? Ask for it!

Julie Entwistle, MBA, BHSc (OT), BSc (Health / Gerontology)

McMaster University’s Occupational Therapy program was very much grounded in the concept of feedback.  While sometimes contrived, and definitely awkward, giving and receiving feedback is an essential skill in relationships, parenting, work and school.

Recently I was in one of my MBA classes and the professor circulated feedback forms to the class asking for our input on how the course was going.  In my many years of university, I have never had a professor ask for feedback during the course.  Usually the instructor evaluation forms are circulated at the end, when a) the feedback does not directly benefit the people that provide it (the class is over anyway), and b) the students never know if their feedback has value or elicits change.

In the case of this particular class, the professor, at the start of the following lecture, summarized the feedback he received.  He commented on what people liked and did not like about the class so far and told us how he was going to adjust his sails to meet the needs of his audience.  Brilliant.

Reflecting on this reminded me of the recent times when I have asked for feedback and benefited from the outcome.  At home, we engaged in a Stop, Start, Continue exercise with our four daughters.  We all had six pieces of paper with our own, and each other’s, names at the top.  Our job was to comment on what we felt that we each needed to stop doing, start doing, and continue doing in our own mind, and then also for each other.  Basically, we were giving and receiving feedback on our skills as mom, dad, daughter or sister.  The result was amazing.  The kids took the exercise seriously and we all learned more about ourselves through the eyes of the people closest to us.   It was a valuable exercise for them and us, and something we will continue to do going forward.

At work, I also asked for feedback from colleagues, clients and customers.  I circulated a questionnaire via email that allowed people to anonymously let me know how I was performing in my job.  Then, I also engaged in a self-initiated 360 review that provided those closest to me the opportunity to highlight, from their perspective, my personal strengths and weaknesses.

Why is feedback so important to me?  I am not as much interested in ensuring I am living up to the expectations of others, as I am interested in ensuring I am not naïve to my own faults.  It is always easier to see the faults in others and yet how often do we really reflect on our own skills?  I believe that the path to achieving my personal best involves understanding myself through my eyes and the eyes of those around me.  So, if you want feedback, just ask for it!   How is my blog by the way?