Photos of MB-AIOTA Web Conference

World OT Day 2014

MUMBAI BRANCH OF AIOTA 

IS PROUD TO SUPPORT

WORLD OCCUPATIONAL THERAPY DAY 2014

World OT Day Details here: http://www.wfot.org/AboutUs/WorldOTDay.aspx

Doctor's orders –play video games

The Mumbai Branch of AIOTA congratulates its member Dr Saifuddin Bijliwala  (O.T) for creating Occupational Therapy awareness !

Doctor's orders –play video game

 TIMES OF INDIA Article by Sharmila Ganesan Ram, TNN | Jun 29, 2014, 07.31AM IST

Saiyam's muscles are neither patient nor totally in control. Within a span of ten minutes, they have made the eight-year-old boy play beach volleyball, salute an army general with the wrong hand, curse a formidable tennis opponent in Hindi and duck a little too late to avoid being hit by a virtual shoe.

Even as he waits for his `teacher' to change the video game, Saiyam is restless. "How did you stay put in your mother's tummy for nine months?" Dr Saifuddin Bijliwala asks him.

Bijliwala is the director of Jumpstart, an occupational therapy centre in Mumbai for kids with developmental challenges ranging from cerebral palsy to autism. Saiyam suffers from Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder (ADHD), which means he gets bored easily , doesn't always remember to use his left hand even though he is a leftie and his speech isn't as fast as his thoughts. Saiyam plays a series of Nintendo Wii and PlayStation 2 games because gaming, Bijliwala believes, is a crucial part of changing the nervous system.  

OCCUPATIONAL THERAPIST BADGE

Benefits of Occupational Therapy for Autism

Article from web md

Link to original article

A person who has autism often has trouble communicating and interacting with other people; his or her interests, activities, and play skills may be limited. Occupational therapy may help people with autism develop these skills at home and in school.

What’s the role of occupational therapy (OT) in treating autism?

Occupational therapists study human growth and development and a person’s interaction with the environment through daily activities. They are experts in the social, emotional, and physiological effects of illness and injury. This knowledge helps them promote skills for independent living in people with autism and other developmental disorders.

Occupational therapists work as part of a team that includes parents, teachers, and other professionals. They help set specific goals for the person with autism. These goals often involve social interaction, behavior, and classroom performance.

Occupational therapists can help in two main ways: evaluation and therapy.

How is occupational therapy useful for evaluation of autism?

The therapist observes children to see if they can do tasks they are expected to do at their ages -- getting dressed or playing a game, for example. Sometimes, the therapist will have the child videotaped during the day in order to see how the child interacts with his or her environment in order to better assess the kind of care the child needs. The therapist might note any of the following:

• Attention span and stamina
• Transition to new activities
• Play skills
• Need for personal space
• Responses to touch or other types of stimuli
• Motor skills such as posture, balance, or manipulation of small objects
• Aggression or other types of behaviors
• Interactions between the child and caregivers

How does occupational therapy help a person with autism?

Once an occupational therapist has gathered information, he or she can develop a program for your child. There is no single ideal treatment program. But early, structured, individualized care has been shown to work best.

Occupational therapy may combine a variety of strategies. These can help your child respond better to his or her environment. These OT strategies include:

• Physical activities, such as stringing beads or doing puzzles, to help a child develop coordination and body awareness
• Play activities to help with interaction and communication
• Developmental activities, such as brushing teeth and combing hair
• Adaptive strategies, including coping with transitions

What are the benefits of occupational therapy for autism?

The overall goal of occupational therapy is to help the person with autism improve his or her quality of life at home and in school. The therapist helps introduce, maintain, and improve skills so that people with autism can be as independent as possible.

These are some of the skills occupational therapy may foster:

• Daily living skills, such as toilet training, dressing, brushing teeth, and other grooming skills
• Fine motor skills required for holding objects while handwriting or cutting with scissors
• Gross motor skills used for walking, climbing stairs, or riding a bike
• Sitting, posture, or perceptual skills, such as telling the differences between colors, shapes, and sizes
• Awareness of his or her body and its relation to others 
• Visual skills for reading and writing
• Play, coping, self-help, problem solving, communication, and social skills

By working on these skills during occupational therapy, a child with autism may be able to:

• Develop peer and adult relationships
• Learn how to focus on tasks
• Learn how to delay gratification
• Express feelings in more appropriate ways
• Engage in play with peers
• Learn how to self-regulate
  

     

  What is sensory integration therapy?

  You may have heard a lot about sensory integration therapy. That’s because some researchers estimate that eight out of 10 children with autism have problems processing sensory input. For example, they can’t filter out background noise. Other signs of processing issues include:
  
  
• Problems with balance
• Problems with body position in space
• Oversensitivity to touch and the feel of certain types of clothing, such as socks with seams

With autism, social, behavioral, or attention problems can be partly a result of these sensory challenges.

Although more research is needed, OT can help with sensory integration and some of the related behavioral problems. Research suggests sensory integration therapy is less helpful in improving academic performance.

Examples of sensory integration therapy include:

• Being brushed or deeply touched and massaged
• Compressing elbows and knees
• Swinging
• Spinning on a scooter
• Wearing a weighted vest.

Multimedia and Video games as an Adjunct to Occupational Therapy

JumpStart Therapy Centre invites Occupational Therapists  to participate in a seminar on

“Multimedia and Video games as an Adjunct to Occupational Therapy”

The seminar presented by Mr. Saif Bijliwala and team aims at:

·   Demystifying gaming.

·   Identifying how gaming can be used to achieve specific goals in Occupational Therapy.

·   Providing “hands on” experience to facilitate discussions

·         Date: Saturday, 30th June 2012

·         Time: 2:00 pm to 4:30 pm

·         Venue: Jump Start Therapy Centre, 122 Unique Industrial Estate,

·         Twin Tower Lane, Opp Siddhivinayak Mandir, Prabhadevi, Mumbai 400,025 

 

·          Registration Rs 100/-  To register please sms your name and contact details to 9833186682 or by email to aashishfoundation@gmail.com  before 29th June 2012

THE "OCCUPATIONAL THERAPIST "BADGE

Available once more !

Dear Occupational Therapists, For your annual MB-AIOTA membership & 

collecting the OT Badge, contact :

Dr Shilpshree (91 9323863498) / Dr Vaijanti (91 9819605032)

 

 

 

Pics Courtesy: Dr Raviraj Shetty

NEED FOR PAEDIATRIC OCCUPATIONAL THERAPISTS IN SCHOOLS

Paediatric health care in metropolitan cities in addition to maintain disease free status and optimal health status also includes identification of delay in children’s occupations of daily living i.e. play, school work and social skills.

Paediatric occupational therapy emerged as a speciality branch of occupational therapy in view of this need. Paediatric occupational therapists work from the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit(NICU) addressing neurological delay affecting development to school setups involving difficulties in social skills, cognitive skills, perceptual skills, writing skills ,attention issues and sensory processing issues.

Inclusive education laws require that all children have a right to education and going to a regular school (the so-called normal school). If the needs exceed a regular school and are not met then a special school catering to the needs of the child is required.

One would wonder why a paediatric OT would intervene at the school. In a school setup which is the natural environment, therapists can understand the magnitude of a problem better as the child is surrounded by children of his age. He would react very differently when other children of his age are around as compared to being alone. That is why children react differently when they are seen at a clinic then at school or even home.           

Occupational therapists are employed in few school and not many as the need for the same is not felt in regular schools as compared to those who admit differently abled children.

The therapist assesses the child referred by the teacher when presented with the following concerns:

·        Difficulty with maintaining attention

·        Writing problems

·        Social skills deficits

·        Difficulty in performing daily skills in school e.g. Toileting, washing hands, face, care of personal stuff, eating, and functional mobility.

·        Time management problems.

·   Cognitive skills required in school tasks- sorting, sequencing, memory, good activity performance.

·        Visual deficits

·        Perception deficits.

·        Sensory processing problems.

·        Gross motor and fine motor co-ordination difficulties

·        Endurance problems e.g. getting tired easily.

·        Behavioural problems.

Following the referral, the therapist undertakes an evaluation including history of the child and the presenting problems on part of the parent followed by assessing the child. This helps the therapist to develop a guideline proforma for developing treatment goals.

The treatment sessions begin after a detailed evaluation report is submitted to the parents and the school management. The sessions are usually scheduled in the school hours and duration includes 30-45 minutes on a twice to thrice a week basis depending on the needs of the child.

This enables addressal of problems at the school level with co-operation from the school staff and enables improved efficacy of efforts helping the child to function effectively and independently in every walk of life.

 

It is a pleasure to see the smile of confidence on a child’s face and only those who value it would cherish it.

Dr. Namita G. Shenai

Paediatric Occupational Therapist

DISHA Centre, Santacruz (w).

Contact No: 9769011233, 9821205194

e-mail: dr_namitashenai@rediffmail.com

This article is based on the need for creating awareness about paediatric occupational therapy in the schools and their stuff.