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resources
We are extremely grateful to Roberts and Day for providing our leading editorial for November ; ‘ Occupational therapists and public contributors working together in the delivery of RCOT resources ’.
They describe the work and the benefits of the RCOT Publications Group , which plays a key part in RCOT ’ s strategic aim to ‘ Lift Up ’ every occupational therapist and to support them , contributing to published resources , including practice guidelines .
These publications stand alongside the evidence published in BJOT as tools for occupational therapists to develop and improve the profession .
Our Editor ’ s Choice article is a systematic review , ‘ The effect of action observation training on gait and balance of patients with neurological and musculoskeletal disorders ’, by Shamsi et al .
They conclude that patients in the chronic phase of stroke might benefit more from action observation training plus occupational therapy in different aspects of gait than orthopaedic patients and those with Parkinson ’ s .
Lived experience is a key theme this issue . In ‘ What is the lived experience of mothers in a Level- IV neonatal intensive care unit ?’, by Nelson et al , a phenomenological design was used to interview mothers of premature infants in a Level-IV neonatal intensive care unit .
There is an importance for neonatal occupational therapists to provide support for mothering occupations for mothers from a variety of demographic and cultural backgrounds .
In ‘ Never think doing a job is easy : The lived experience of work for people who have an intellectual and developmental disability ’,
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Ramsey et al provided first-person work-related experiences of six people with a mild IDD .
The collaborators ’ stories highlighted that individuals supporting people with IDD towards or in work , including occupational therapists , need to adopt a nuanced systemic perspective of the context surrounding the person .
In ‘ Occupational performance and satisfaction of individuals with mental disorders in Jordan : A cross-sectional study ’, Madi et al aimed to explore occupational performance and satisfaction in individuals with mental disorders , explore the challenging occupations , investigate the relationship between demographic characteristics to occupational performance and satisfaction , and investigate the factors affecting the occupational performance of those individuals .
We have several articles in this issue relating to young people , adolescents and children . ‘ Occupational therapy incorporating dogs for autistic children and young people : Parent perspectives ’, by Richardson et al , aimed to explore parent perspectives about the Animal Assisted Therapy ( AAT ) component of the occupational therapy intervention their child / adolescent received across five weekly sessions .
Parents valued AAT occupational therapy involving dogs . Future studies should investigate how to best target this occupational therapy approach for autistic children and adolescents . In ‘ Handwriting and typing : Occupational therapy practice when supporting adolescents with handwriting difficulties ’, Nightingale et al explored the support provided to adolescents with handwriting difficulties by occupational therapists , and the contextual factors that influence their decision making .
Strategies are needed to address the knowledge-practice gap , including evidence-based guidelines . Further research examining whether , when and how to introduce typing as an alternative to handwriting would support best practice .
Finally , we have ‘ Investigating autonomic biomarkers of sensory processing patterns in young adults ’ by Kerley et al . In this cross-sectional laboratory study , 100 young adults completed the adolescent / adult sensory profile .
This study showed , for the first time in young adults , that sensory processing patterns may be linked to patterns of autonomic balance .
Visit www . rcot . co . uk / practice-resources / journals / bjot .
60 OTnews November 2022