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Wow Wow Wow ⟩
April 11, 2013, by Amber

Classes Getting Involved School/Life Balance

Life has been moving at a million miles per hour since my last post! It seems that EVERYTHING happens in the Spring, and my life has been incredibly full of a variety of tasks and fun activities. I have been learning more about my path through the doctoral program and getting prepared for that transition. Another transition has occurred with the onboarding of the new student ambassadors who will be entertaining you with their blogs starting in a few short weeks! The new ambassadors have already been involved in several events. On April 1st, we celebrated the start of OT Month by hosting a rally with lunch, skits, and some awesome OT swag! Just last week, we hosted the incoming students at the Admitted Students’ Reception at the beautiful Town and Gown venue at USC.

The AOTA national conference for occupational therapists will take place in a couple of weeks. I am so proud to be presenting my research on animal assisted therapy at the conference as a poster presentation! I am also looking forward to Dr. Florence Clark’s farewell address and the special USC Alumni celebration taking place on Saturday night. I was also honored to be a part of our Division campaign video, which will be unveiled at the celebration.

Attending the Occupational Therapy Extravaganza last Saturday was a wonderful experience. It is planned each year by our honor society PTE, and they hosted a day of amazing speakers and creative showcases of our students’ work. In my role as Co-Chair of our student council OTSC, I have also been spending several hours per week planning our students’ end of the year celebration, for which we have chartered a private boat for a night cruise with a DJ, photo booth, and more fun! I am greatly looking forward to that celebration, and the even more amazing celebration a week after when I graduate from this program with a Master’s degree.

With all this excitement it is easy to forget that I still have lots of coursework and projects to complete, not least of all our comprehensive exam which covers material we have learned across the entire program! I can’t believe it will all be over in a few short weeks!

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Better late than never ⟩
April 10, 2013, by Paula

Classes Community Externships Getting Involved

It has been WAY too long since I have made an entry (whoops!). The past month has been filled with so many activities, visitors, projects, discussions, and so much planning for the remainder of the semester! Although the externship is now a few weeks behind us, I know that it is constantly present in each of our minds. As I mentioned weeks ago, I had the amazing opportunity to work alongside an interdisciplinary palliative care team here in Los Angeles and to advocate the importance of an OT being a member of their team. My experience was so eye-opening and I think of the people I worked with through those two weeks still every day — I know that this will not change anytime soon. The team was extremely receptive and supportive of what I had to bring to the table and of my ideas and examples for the applicability of OT to serve this population. It was a very exciting, invigorating experience for me to be able to advocate for the profession in this way.

Needless to say, this is a challenging population to work with no matter how you look at things. Overall, it was great to see how the team supports one another and how they ultimately put the family and their concerns at the forefront of treatment. Although we would all wish this quality of treatment for a family member or friend, it is sadly not the reality for many people needing medical attention. One of the most powerful experiences I had during my externship occurred in debrief/conversation with my direct supervisor after we had visited a patient and the family. She told me: “you have to have somewhere to put all of this.” And it is as simple as that. We require balance just as our patients do. If we as practitioners don’t take the time to process and really work through what we are experiencing in the workplace, then how are we possibly expecting to provide our patients with the highest quality of care we can offer? It made me think back to a professor within the Division who told the class in one of our first lectures when we began the program. She told us all that “you need to have therapy before you can give therapy.” This gives a whole new way for us as OTs to evaluate our own capacity for MINDFULNESS. :]

This past Friday, the Division hosted the Admitted Student Reception in which we welcomed the newest addition to the USC OT family — SO FUN! It was great to be a part of this event as a Student Ambassador, as I very clearly remember the 2011 Reception where I finally decided to take the USC plunge :] The new class is amazing and so enthusiastic about OT.

Saturday was the annual Relay For Life at USC. This event is a 24-hour fundraiser for The American Cancer Society and has been close to my heart for many years. Our team this year, “OT4LIFE,” was a great representation of OT spirit. This event made me think back to the days at my externship site and the support and value that a community can provide to someone fighting through such a hard battle, such as those living with cancer. Many of the children I worked with had been told that they would not make it to their next birthday. At Relay, I was able to speak with several adults who had been told the same thing, either about their own health or that of their child. But they were still present at an event in order to give back and continue to be involved in the community which had offered them support in a difficult time. Talk about perseverance and having the will to FIGHT BACK. Read about one of the touching stories shared at Relay For Life.

We’re just 10 days into April and OT month with so many awesome events and experiences already. Keep them coming, I’m loving it.

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Inspired ⟩
February 12, 2013, by Paula

Classes What are OS/OT?

So this entry may seem to mirror Amber’s last post a bit but I have been feeling the same excitement at the progress I know that we all have made over the past years. I feel like we are finally pushing away those clouds of self-doubt that come with being a novice, wide-eyed student and are looking forward to exploring what our future careers will be with anticipation. The energy is definitely different mid-way through this final semester and it’s as though there was a transformation sometime within the winter break which really ignited the class. This is a great thing!!

Within the Motor Control elective, I have had the opportunity to meet some amazing people. My clinical observation placement is located in the Jacquelin Perry Institute (JPI) at Rancho Los Amigos National Rehabilitation Center, where I primarily follow an OTR/L who works with patients in the Stroke Rehabilitation program. I know that you have heard each of us mention Rancho by now. This rehabilitation center is certainly deserving of the highly esteemed reputation it has developed over nearly a century of providing services. The aspect of Rancho which I value most as a student is the enthusiasm for learning and the obvious effort that each member of the rehabilitation team makes to encourage students while also maintaining such a high quality of care for the people they treat each day. For every student who has started out in the clinical setting, there are those moments of, “Oh no, I cannot remember what they said about this in class,” interspersed with moments of “But, what if I do something wrong?!” It is normal; it is called ‘learning’; and it happens to us all along the way. When a location makes an obvious effort to support the learning experience and clearly has confidence in the ability of the student, as they do at Rancho, it resonates with the students.

Today during lab, a fellow student and I were told that we would be leading a co-treat with a gentleman we have observed in therapy before. We were able to evaluate, compete an occupational profile for the individual (including his prior function, changes he has experienced and what he would like to get back to doing), assess his scapular and thoracic alignment and perform scapular mobilizations to facilitate a more appropriate posture necessary to support activity in therapy. It has been so gratifying to work with people through the many different settings in fieldwork and to learn so much from each of them along the way . . . I feel like I am always saying this, but I am so looking forward to actually being an OT (soon)!

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Feeling Like A “Real” OT! ⟩
February 11, 2013, by Amber

Classes What are OS/OT?

This semester I am taking several elective courses, all of which are very exciting because I have chosen to take them based on my interests. They are all very hands-on and full of practical knowledge that I will use every day in practice. The most hands-on of these elective courses is Enhancing Motor Control for Occupation. In this course we are learning how to facilitate the recovery of motor control after an individual has sustained an upper motor neuron lesion, as may happen during a stroke or traumatic brain injury. We learn different theories and techniques, such as Neuro-Developmental Treatment (NDT) and apply them to occupational therapy treatment. Best of all, the instructor is a working practitioner at Rancho Los Amigos National Rehabilitation Center and the class takes place onsite in the inpatient unit.

A requirement of this course is that I observe occupational therapists using motor control during real treatment sessions for two hours per week. One of the first patients I observed was an elderly gentleman with a goofy sense of humor. He had a diagnosis of Alzheimer’s Disease and had recently suffered from a stroke. The occupational therapist completed a visual assessment with the gentleman to confirm that he displayed left-sided inattention. This means that he consistently ignored information on the left side of his visual field. For example, when reading an eye chart he only read the right half of each line. The therapist mentioned that in subsequent sessions he would be working with the man to help him pay attention to his left side.

During the session I spoke with the man’s wife and asked her what sort of things he liked to do before he was limited by his conditions. She mentioned that he was someone who could “fix anything” and that he was an avid golfer. At the end of the session, I related these facts to the occupational therapist and suggested he may use these activities to facilitate attention to the left. He was not previously aware of the man’s interest in golf and thanked me for my input. I saw the gentleman again at his next session. The occupational therapist had found a golf ball and fashioned a club out of a cane turned upside down (a testimony to the creativity of OTs!). The therapist situated a target to the left side of the man, and like a pro he overcame his left inattention to hit the target every time! It was wonderful to feel that I had contributed to a small breakthrough for this man who is struggling to regain the function he had lost. During that session I felt like a “real” OT and it was fantastic! I’m looking forward many more moments like this in the future as I gain confidence in my abilities.

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The Hand You’re Dealt ⟩
January 28, 2013, by Paula

Classes What are OS/OT?

So far this semester, it has been interesting to experience the different teaching styles of the professors in the elective courses. For the most part, this is the first time that the students have had a chance to take classes with these instructors. After being a student for pretty much your entire life, you begin to find certain techniques that work really well for you, and others which do not. I’ve always enjoyed seeing what teaching strategies our instructors bring to the table in order to harness our highest potential and attention. This could be a special challenge with the new schedule of night classes this semester.

In our first few meetings of the Hand Rehabilitation elective, our professor encouraged the class to take a few minutes to think of what occupation would be most impacted if we were to seriously injure our hands. I always have felt that this is an awesome type of exercise to develop skills of empathy. Hearing the variety of occupations my classmates came up with was really interesting and gave an insight to the potential range of importance that can be placed on an activity by the individual. The discussion made me think about the many important activities and moments in my life, past and present, which would be altered if I were to have a serious hand injury. It also made me think of the many ways that hands are used in our lives such as for self expression and in social and family roles (some uses which have been important in my life are pictured below). I had a very hard time settling on something that would make me feel like I “couldn’t” do something — I began to realize that I was set on the fact that whatever would happen, I would work through it as much as was possible and find ways to adapt my occupational involvement so that I could still fit in the aspects of my life which make me feel like myself. The discussion eventually led to a question of resiliency, temperament and feelings of an internal locus of control (don’t you love when all of your coursework relates and you can create these cool webs of knowledge? ;]). What would I do if I had an injury keeping me out of my sports of swimming and water polo? It isn’t always about adapting the environment or introducing a device to assist function. Sometimes it is more about adjusting the goals and the attitudes associated with the barriers imposed on the individual. All of this was running through my mind when I realized we were starting in on another portion of the lecture. Here’s to a semester of electives!

“The proverb warns that ‘you should not bite the hand that feeds you.’ But maybe you should if it prevents you from feeding yourself” — Thomas S. Szasz

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