Occupational Therapy News OTnews July 2019 | Page 57

PROFESSIONAL RESOURCES Are you an occupational therapist undertaking research? The Royal College of Occupational Therapists is currently developing a new vision, strategy and action plan for research and development to guide the profession’s progress and direction of travel over the next five to 10 years, which we anticipate will be published in the autumn. In order to measure the impact of the new strategy on future research and researcher development, it is necessary to map the position of contemporary occupational therapy research across the UK, using metrics to capture scale and impact. RCOT has commissioned Sheffield Hallam University to conduct an assessment of contemporary research, which will recruit UK registered occupational therapists undertaking research, to explore their roles, demographics and research activities. The project aims to: • recruit participants for a structured telephone interview about the overall occupational therapy research activity in their institution. Participants should work in an occupational therapy teaching department or research centre and have knowledge of the number of occupational therapy researchers within their institution; and • conduct a survey with UK-based occupational therapists who are active researchers who have been involved in one or more research project/s since 2014. Are you an occupational therapist who undertakes research? Do you think of yourself as a researcher? If you would like to take part in the project please contact the research team by Thursday 15 August. The research team is also keen to hear from any research-focused networks or professional groups (including Facebook and other social media groups) that potential respondents might be part of and that can be contacted in order to invite further participants. Dr Jo Watson, RCOT assistant director – education and research, said: ‘We hope that many of you will decide to participate in this important research. It will provide an initial benchmark against which to measure our progress in achieving the ambitions set out in the new Research and Development Strategy, which itself will contribute towards positioning the profession, and our members, for the 21st century.’ If you are interested in participating or suggesting a research-focused network and/or professional group for the researchers to engage with, please contact: Mehreen Afzal at: [email protected]. ac.uk. BJOT NEXT ISSUE The August issue of BJOT is a special issue on low vision rehabilitation, guest edited by Dr Beth Barstow, at the University of Alabama. As Dr Barstow points out in her editorial for the issue, the topic is timely for occupational therapy – the World Health Organization estimates there are 246 million individuals throughout the world living with low vision, and this rate is expected to grow over the next few decades, primarily due to our ageing global population. The special issue contains articles on diverse topics addressing visual impairment from a broad international perspective, with contributions from Canada, Japan, the Netherlands, New Zealand, the UK and the US. Duquette et al (2019) present results of a secondary data analysis exploring occupational performance outcomes measured using the Melbourne Low-Vision ADL Index. Kaldenberg, in an article applying qualitative methodology, investigates the barriers and facilitators to low vision rehabilitation services for older adults with visual impairment living in the northeastern US. Wagener and Krieger (2019) applied a cross-sectional descriptive approach to determine occupational participation and the quality of life of individuals with acquired brain injury-related oculomotor impairments. Bakker et al (2019), in a study out of the Netherlands, describe the lived experiences of adults with vision loss who report experiences of fatigue during occupational performance, while McGrath and Corrado (2019), applied an exploratory research approach to examine the environmental factors influencing technology adoption by older adults with age-related vision loss. Hazelton et al (2019) conducted an email survey to determine training tools utilised by healthcare professionals in Scotland to address visual field loss, providing an in-depth view of the most commonly used tools and procedures for using these interventions in clinical practice settings. Finally, two articles address the important IADL of community mobility. The first, by McMullan and Butler (2019), provided an interpretative descriptive study from New Zealand to determine self- regulation strategies older adults with vision impairment employ using a motorised scooter for community mobility. The second article, by Shimizu et al (2019), investigated the use of a new grip for long canes used by children with visual impairment for effective community mobility. All articles are published online at the journal’s OnlineFirst page as soon as ready. Visit BJOT via your member login at www.rcot.co.uk to browse these and other recent publications in full (please go via the RCOT web site links to the journal). We have a new call for articles submissions on the topic of cancer rehabilitation, guest edited by Kathleen Lyons, at Dartmouth, US. For more information: http://journals.sagepub.com/page/bjo/call-for-papers OTnews July 2019 57