It’s the inaugural Ability Partners Journal Club! This Journal Club is all about becoming a better Evidence-Based Occupational Therapist. 

Journal in review: Clarkson, C, Boshoff, L & Kernot J 2021, ‘Occupational Therapy Interventions for Adolescents: A Scoping Review’, The Allied Health Scholar, vol. 2, no. 1, pp. 51-102.

Practical applications and take homes:

• OT interventions for adolescents should not be grouped together with paediatric interventions as adolescence presents with unique occupational challenges (high school, employment, social interaction, beginning of intimate relationships, etc.). Interventions should therefore be tailored to the client themselves and their developmental stage (particularly in the presence of development disorder diagnoses where clients may not be performing at the level of their neurotypical peers).
• OT engagement should include communication and collaboration with parents, caregivers and/or legal guardians and the client themselves. The use of technology was also found to be an effective medium for interventions (i.e. routine planners, apps, etc.).
• Review has stimulated further need to look into specific research behind interventions for Social Scripts
• We must think critically about the weight we place on the ASD diagnosis vs “secondary” diagnoses such as ADHD (where ADHD may in fact be the primary issue)
• “Show-your-work”

• • Initial Assessment: We should be using a process to define “operating age” when making decisions on treatment approaches
  • Initial Assessment: We should be using a process to identify the “primary impairment” in a systematic way.

Leave your comments and questions below.

Join us next time for another edition of Ability Partners Journal Club.