Cygnet Hospital Wyke and Cygnet Lodge Brighouse started off the week by tweeting photos displaying what made them enter the occupational therapy profession. They had a great response to this with ex-service users responding with their own memories of how their occupational therapist had impacted upon their time in hospital. They ended the week with an informal coffee afternoon, allowing staff and service users the opportunity to increase the awareness of the profession and share how Occupational Therapy makes a difference.
OT’s at Cygnet Hospital Stevenage regularly celebrate and promote occupational therapy with new staff members during the Mandatory Training week slot. The aim is to support new starters in their understanding of occupational therapy, in the hope of capturing and inspiring some of the support workers to potentially consider occupational therapy as a career.
The session during this particular week consisted of a short presentation about the philosophy of OT, how OT’s can promote recovery not just within a mental health setting but with patients with a variety of illnesses, disabilities, etc. Highlighting the fact that whatever the setting, the aim of OT is always to help people to continue to do things that help define their roles and live the life they want.
The attendees played a game of Blokus, and they were encouraged to think about a group of service users playing the game and to think about what the OT may be able to assess through the use of the game. The attendees fed back that this was a good way of understanding what OT’s are looking for and assessing whilst seemingly ‘just playing a game’.
During Cygnet Hospital Beckton’s recent conference, OT’s hosted a stand complete with OT Week paraphernalia from the College of Occupational Therapy to promote the profession with those attending the conference.
Finally Diane Ivory (Occupational Therapist, Cygnet Hospital Taunton) has shared with us why she became an OT:
“A long story cut very short! I came back to the U.K after living abroad for years, children now grown, me 40!…It had always been in my mind to go into healthcare of some kind but wasn’t sure what, maybe mental health nursing? So off I went to the open evening of the access course, saying to myself if I’m the oldest I’m coming home! (I wasn’t the oldest) Six months into the course and still not sure what I wanted to do, a lady from the O.T college came to give a talk.
Not knowing what O.T was, I was blown away to discover that there was a profession that was about enabling and promoting independence! I chatted to her after and she invited me to shadow her for a day. That was it I was sold and very excited! Since that day, I have never looked back and tell everybody that I meet what a great profession it is!”
If you are interested in joining one of our Occupational Therapy teams please check out our latest vacancies on the Cygnet Jobs website.