Reflective Portfolio of an Occupational Therapist

pondering Portfolio of an occupational TherapistReflective Portfolio and continuing master key using PortfolioThe HCPC defines a hap Professional Development (CPD) portfolio as A range of tuition activities by dint of which wellness captains maintain and develop through erupt their c beer to retard that they retain their capacity to practise safely, effectively and legally within their evolving desktop of coiffe. (Allied Health Professions project) Put simply, a continuing Professional Development Portfolio is a way for passkeys to overlay to learn and develop throughout their interesters so they keep their skills and knowledge up to date and atomic number 18 fitting to melt safely, legally and effectively within genial services or the secret sector.Alsop (2000) recognises that there is a wide range of benefits of CPD. By holding a Continuing Professional Development Portfolio it facilitates to encourage a higher type of whatsoeverbodyal professional performa nce. It demonstrates a commitment from the wellnesscare professional to stop up the best manage is given as rise as demonstrating a dedicated commitment to service users.Continuing Professional Development Portfolio requires most specific documents. For example a CPD portfolio requires a fully up-to-date course of study Vitae and a personal statement with a summary of current employ and how your CPD improved the attribute of your work and the benefits you withstand provided to your service users. As rise as the basic neces personateies there are a variety of things that could be safe to include in ones Continuing Professional Development Portfolio more(prenominal)(prenominal) as informative hand-outs or articles that have impacted upon your visiting of occupational Therapy or examples of your skills applied to your current situation. Another key aspect of keeping a Continuing Professional Development Portfolio is to have regular ruminations of your bearing practices and sagacitys. By turning ones have gots of practice into a written form of enfranchisement it exit help each individual identify and support their attainment outcomes and scholarship postulate. It also helps to have a wide range of learning activities including look review/feed rearward and group projects. As well as peer feedback from group work it would also be honest to include feedback on assignments from professors, illustrating how your learning has developed, and your practice has improved.The Code of ethical motive and Professional Conduct ( cot, 2010) specifies the requirements of an occupational Therapist in relation to keeping a Continuing Professional Development Portfolio. It states that all occupational Therapists must progress to keep a CPD portfolio that may be audited by the HCPC every five years. Each professional must suffer trusted that their CPD Portfolio shows a variety of different kinds of activities and that each activity is relevant to their l ine of work. Each CPD portfolio should aim to improve the quality of work you produce, and ensure that each wellnesscare professional is able to practice safely and effectively within their scope of practice as well as being able to practise within the legal and goodness boundaries of each varying profession. For example an occupational Therapist because they have such a holistic approach to their care would accept to be aware(predicate) of the impact of culture, equality and variety show on their practice (HCPC 2013) With each wellness care professional updating their Continuing Professional Development Portfolio they ordain be able to draw on up to date and catch knowledge and skills to inform their practice decisions and to help them understand the requisite to score and maintain a safe practice milieu. However a Continuing Professional Development Portfolio is not just kept by occupational Therapists but are required from the entire multidisciplinary police squadA mul tidisciplinary team (MDT) is composed of members from different healthcare professions with specialised skills and expertise. This is beneficial to the patients because when professionals from a range of disciplines with different but complementary skills, knowledge and experience work together they are able to deliver comprehensive healthcare aimed at providing the best possible outcome for the physical and psychosocial necessitate of a patient and their carers. Multidisciplinary care occurs due to the fact that a patient needs may change with time and treatment. Since the team has such a various(a) range of professions to call upon for a patients care the structure of the team may also change to meet these needs. There are many health care professions that make up a multidisciplinary team ranging from District Nurses, Physiotherapist, Doctors, livery and Language Therapists and of course Occupational TherapistsThe role of an Occupational Therapist keep provide many benefits wi thin the multidisciplinary team. Their specific training allows them to hold the typical role of understanding a patients medical, physical and psychological state and the impact that their disability or injury susceptibility be imposing on their lives. It also helps that occupational therapists are able to turn to an individuals broader goals that will help a patient ruffle with their local community and reduce depression and routineicipate in the activities that are consequential to them. Essentially Occupational Therapists prove to be instrumental in combined teams as they are able to understand both the health and social care context of a thickening. The Occupational Therapists have a unique hazard to link various professionals dealing with a clients care. They post act as the cohesive agent to maximise the effectiveness of a team. They have involvement in working with both health and social care and return to work schemes. Un bid the rest of the multidisciplinary team Occupational Therapists provide a client centred approach to their practice, they look at the person as a whole so involving the clients occupation, their environment and their spirituality into their treatment. The occupational therapist values individual experience, cultural diversity, religious beliefs and lifestyle diversity in their clients.The expression of these values means that occupational therapy is essentially a flexible process in which the therapist listens to the client in come in to understand and respond to their individual needs, values, interests and aspirations. For intervention to be integrated into the life and context of the individual, the family and carers, it must be culturally sensitive and culturally relevant. (Creek 2003, p29). This client centred approach is also greatly aided by the fact that occupational therapists have an extensive knowledge and understanding of the equipment and adaptations that are a study part of healthcare services (Rabiee and Glendinning 2010). This makes Occupational Therapists a valuable part of the MDT for the government as they drastically help reduce the apostrophize of care for some clients.A recent study which explored the relationship between formulation of correct equipment from an Occupational Therapist and the reduction on care parcel costs and residential care found that on average the cost of an eight week care package was dropped by over 60,000 (Hill. S (2007). This was because housing adaptations made by the Occupational Therapist greatly cut back the need for daily visits and reduced or even in some cases removed the costs for home care this ultimately brought savings in that ranged from 1,200 to 29,000 a year. (Heywood and Turner.2007). Ultimately the setting up of supplementary moving and discussion equipment by the occupational therapists reduces the need for two carers to assist the patients with their personal care. In Somerset, of the 125 services users who were assessed 37% o f them are now hardly support by one carer instead of two, with savings of 270,000 achieved. The average initial investment in equipment was 763 per service user (Mickel 2010). This additional money saving shows that the Occupational Therapists are a cost effective and highly efficient members of the multidisciplinary team, who fuck provide holistic, well rounded care to each individual patient.As well as all members of the multidisciplinary team having to keep a Continuing Professional Development Portfolio they must also keep consultion folders. aspect can be defined as a framework through which professionals can explore all issues involved in clinical practice to them it is a means of enabling practitioners to theorise closely practice and thusly enable theory to emerge from practice. Schn (1983) presents the idea that there are two types of contemplateion Firstly there is reflection in follow up this is when the professionals instinctive actions are reflected upon, whi lst they are carrying it out the actions or assessment, and altered as necessary whilst in the situation. Secondly there is reflection on action this is when we as professionals step back from the performance and reflect on that action at a later time and date. galore(postnominal) different professionals have presented different models of reflection for healthcare practitioners to follow, ranging from Graham Gibbs, Christopher thrones and John Driscoll.Graham Gibbs developed his reflective cycle (Gibbs 1988) based upon each tale of David A. Kolbs experiential cycle (Kolb 1984). He suggested how a full unified analysis of a situation could incorporate place using place questions at each stage. It is probably the most cited model by health care professionals but does not contain the number or knowledge of prompt questions contained in some other modelsDescription In this section, the professionals need to explain what they were reflecting on. This means that they need to incl ude background information, such as what it is they were reflecting on and tell the reader who was involved. Its in-chief(postnominal) to remember to keep the information provided relevant, to-the-point and most importantly reassuredial.Feelings In this section the professional needs to discuss their sense of smellings and thoughts about the experience. They need to take in questions such as How did you feel at the time? What did you think at the time? What did you think about the incident afterwards? Here they are able to discuss their emotions honestly.Evaluation-For the evaluation, the professionals need to discuss how well the event went. Including factors such as How they reacted to the situation at hand, and how did other people react to the same situation? What was good and what was terrible about the experience?Analysis- In the analysis, one needs to suppose what might have helped or hindered the event at the time. The professional also has the opportunity here to com pare the experience with the literature they have read.Conclusion- In the conclusion, it is important for the professional to acknowledge whether they could have done anything else what has been learned from the experience consider whether they could you have responded in a different way. If the experience was positive it is important to discuss whether the same actions would be undertaken to ensure the same positive outcomes near time. At the same time considering if there is anything that could have been change a to improve things even further. If the incident was negative then you need to reflect on how this could have been avoided and what needs to be done to make sure it doesnt happen again.I chose Gibbs model of reflection to use in my own assignment, because I found that the structure was easy to follow, and was laid out clearly. The instructions were simple and sequential. In addition to this the model was easy to withstand to my assessments and my clients.Applying the Mod el to an Assessment performed on Placement.For confidentiality reasons during this reflection the client will take the pseudonym of Mrs Jones who was a seventy five year old charr and my educator will go by the pseudonym of Mrs metalworker.Description In this section I will be reflecting upon a wash and ski binding assessment with Mrs Jones that took place on the ward before her returning home. Mrs Jones was in hospital for several months after suffering a fall at home. Mrs Jones lived at home by herself in a two storey house, with three bed dwells but with a downstairs toilet and bathroom. Involved in this assessment were myself, Mrs Jones and Mrs Smith. The assessment took place on the ward in a small wash room and toilet. After her fall Mrs Jones had been using a footer frame to walk around the hospital ward.Feelings As this was my first base assessment on my own naturally I was incredibly nervous. end-to-end the entire assessment I was worried that I was going to make a w rong choice or a poor decision. end-to-end the assessment I was also conscious about trying to actuate my educator, so actually I could be guilty of focussing to a great extent upon impressing my educator than focussing on the patient. However after the assessment had destroyed I did feel that it had been a success Mrs Jones had performed well proving that she was capable of wash drawing and dressing herself with minimal assistance from myself or from Mrs Smith. This ultimately proved that she was ready to return home.Evaluation- During the assessment I felt that I remained calm and stack away and managed to keep my nerves under control. However looking back on the assessment and after a discussion with Mrs Smith, I feel like I could have been a bit firmer with Mrs Jones. For when she kept renting to sit down and rest during the assessment I would let her whereas Mrs Smith utter that she would had encouraged Mrs Jones to keep going. Stating that since being on the ward Mrs J ones had become apply to the nurses doing everything for her and that whilst she was with us I would need to learn to differentiate between Mr Jones accepted need for help, for example when she needed help washing the top of her back and when she was being lazy and trying to get me to do things for her. However Mrs Smith said that being firm but fair with clients would become much easier with age and experience.Analysis- During this assessment I also learnt to give the physical environment much more thought before starting a washing and dressing assessment. The cubical wash room was quite small and I failed to take into consideration that during the assessment I would have to manoeuvre myself, Mrs Jones and Mrs Jones pedestrian frame around the toilet, shower and wash hand basin. I should have realised that I should have entered the wash room first in order to have full access to all the facilities, however I politely followed Mrs Jones into the bathroom, but then had the difficu lty of moving round Mrs Jones and her Zimmer frame in order to move on with the assessment. A greater awareness of the physical environment would have enabled me to pre-empt this inconvenience.Conclusion- In conclusion I feel that the assessment was a positive experience for both myself and Mrs Jones. In order to replicate the same positive experience for both parties, I need to remain confident and emphatic to my clients, whilst ensuring I am true to life(predicate) with their abilities. The fact that I remained in an energetic and encouraging mood help lift the spirits of Mrs Jones, and inspired her to keep going in the assessment even when she claimed she didnt want to. I found that the mood of the Occupational Therapist can quite often transfer to the patient, so rest positive whilst in front of the client is essential to a beneficial and successful assessment.Reflecting on all of my assessments whilst on my placement helped me identify my early learning needs. I realised tha t there is still plenty of room for me to grow and develop not only as a professional but also as a person. Mrs Smith and all of the clients helped me understand that to grow as a professional I need to continue to build therapeutic and respectful relationships with my clients. Although a strong rapport with patients is essential at the same time I need to learn to distance myself emotionally from my clients and to continue to remain professional. For a few times on placement and during initial assessments I found myself becoming emotionally accustomed to my clients, viewing them as if they were a family member, my grandparents for example. In order to become a better professional I need to learn to differentiate understanding and empathy for my clients. Once I have managed this it will be easier for me to learn to find the balance between firm and fair when assessing my elderly clients, and only ask them to do what was realistically achievable. The final learning need that I was able to identify from my multiple written reflections, and from my reflection discussions with Mrs Smith was that as a professional I need to learn to be more confident when in charge of an assessment, but this will be something that will continue to develop and grow with age and experience.In assessing a clients needs and appropriate course of treatment I need to consider which methods will best help achieve the desired outcome. Experience will help develop my ability to determine realistic targets and reflection will enable me to create a portfolio of these methods to achieve those targets. A record of good and effective practices such as exchanges with other Occupational Therapists can only serve to enhance my professional development.References(Allied Health Professions project), Demonstrating competence through CPD, 2002.Alsop, A. 2000. Continuing Professional Development A Guidefor Therapists. London Blackwell Science.COT- College of Occupational Therapists 2010. Code of Ethi cs and Professional Conduct. London. College of Occupational Therapists.Creek J (2003) Occupational therapy defined as a complex intervention. London College of Occupational TherapistsGibbs, G. (1988) Learning by doing a guide to teaching and learning methods. Oxford Further Education Unit.HCPC Health and handle Professions Council 2013.Standards of proficiency for occupational therapists. London. Health Care professions councilHeywood F and Turner L (2007) Better outcomes, lower costs implications for health and Dsocial care budgets of investment in housing adaptations, improvements and equipment a review of the evidence. London Stationery Office.Hill S (2007) Independent living equipment cost savings. Research report identified through the COT Killer Facts Database.Mickel, A (2010) A ticking timebomb. Occupational Therapy News OTnews, 18(5), 38-39Nottingham University saying Models online accessed 25/04/2014 http//www.nottingham.ac.uk/nmp/sonet/rlos/placs/critical_reflection/mod els/gibbs_model.htmlRabiee P, Glendinning C (2010) The organisation and content of home care re-ablement services. (Research plant 2010-01). York University of York, Social Policy Research Unit.Schn D.A. (1983) The Reflective Practitioner. Aldershot. Arena