OT Services

Skill building therapies aim to maximise participation in daily activities and interventions are goal directed toward client and family centred outcomes. Skill building aims to enhance participation in identified daily activities and peer to peer relationship building.

Skills are developed across three domains:

• Cognitive Skills: including decision making, problem solving, creative thinking, critical thinking.
• Emotional Skills: including self-awareness, self-management.
• Interpersonal and social skills: including interpersonal relationship skills, communication,
  social awareness.

OT Mackay offers individualised social skill development* for neurodiverse individuals.

*Social skills are the skills we use every day to interact and communicate with others. They include verbal and non-verbal communication, such as speech, gesture, facial expression and body language. A person has strong social skills if they have the knowledge of behaviours in social situations and understand both written and implied rules when communicating with others.

OT Social Skills Development can assist people with a diagnosis of Intellectual Impairment (II), Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD), Pervasive Developmental Disorder (Not Otherwise Specified) and Asperger’s that may have identified difficulties with social skills.

Home modifications are changes to the structure, layout or fittings of your home to make performing tasks easier. Home modifications aim to enhance mobility, safety and access, reduce accidents, and support independent living.

Common home modifications include:

• Removal of hazards (ie clutter, throw rugs, floor mats)
• Relocation of power points or light switches to improve access
• Grab rails to showers, toilets or home entries
• Prescription and design of landings, platform steps and access ramps according to Australian standards
• Bathroom modifications such as roll-in showers and other access measures
• Modifications to the kitchen to improve access
• Widening of doorways and automatic doors
• Installation of a ceiling hoist to assist person transfers
• Stair lifts
• Environmental control systems

Our Occupational Therapists have completed major/complex home modifications which have included the removal of walls in the bathroom/toilet to increase circulation space and removal of baths to create a level access shower with appropriate drainage and floor gradient; widening of internal and external doors; modifying external access to provide improved access within the confines of existing structures, and considering logical and suitable access point to the home.

We have also redesigned many wheelchair accessible kitchens, bathrooms and toilets following the demolition of existing spaces, to provide safe and accessible environments. We have prescribed automated door openers and Environmental Control Units (ECUs) that can be operated via a wheelchair switch or sophisticated eye gaze and scanning technology.

Home modifications meeting the required Australian Standards have been completed for a variety of clients and funding bodies including the Transport Accident Commission, National Injury Insurance Scheme Queensland, Department of Veterans’ Affairs, private clients and NDIS participants.

Cognition refers to the thinking and processing skills needed to accomplish complex every day activities. It encompasses information processing, attention, memory, and executive functions (planning, sequencing, problem solving, self-monitoring, self-awareness). Functional cognition is the interaction between cognitive skills and daily living tasks and activities.

Your Occupational Therapist will focus interventions and the relationship between cognitive skills, functional performance and environmental context to enhance your daily life experience and participation.

We will work closely with clients and families either in their home, in our clinic or via telehealth to develop a customised program that is goal directed, and specific to your needs.

Area’s for assistance may include:

• Memory and cognition – Programs developed to improve memory, cognition, and executive functioning to increase independence and your ability to resume daily function.
• Vision and visual perception – Programs will involve assessment of both primary visual skills and visual perception to guide retraining in the areas of deficit, teaching compensation techniques, substitution of unimpaired skills, or adapting the task or environment.
• Functional Rehabilitation programs to enhance the management of personal care and domestic tasks, leisure interests, money management, study, work, and shopping.

When you need help with everyday tasks, you can use Assistive Technology to make it easier to do things and/or keep you (and others) safe.

Assistive technology is any device, system or design, that allows you to perform a task that you would otherwise be unable to do. Assistive technology can increase the ease and safety with which a task can be performed.

Assistive technology can include simple products such as those that assist you to open a jar or bottle, or turn a tap or open a door. Complex technologies can include specialised computers, powered wheelchairs, home automation and environmental control systems.

Commonly, Assistive Technology:

• Enhances participation and independence in daily activities including showering, dressing, washing, cooking, gardening and community access
• Enhances mobility through the use of walking aids, mobility scooters, shower chairs, toilet seat raisers, wheelchairs, electric lift recliner chairs, bed mobility items and electric beds
• Improves health and safety through environmental control systems, mobile or ceiling hoists and pressure relieving cushions and mattresses.

For NDIS participants, there are different levels of Assistive Technology. They are:

• Basic Assistive Technology – Level 1
• Standard Assistive Technology – Level 2
• Specialised Assistive Technology – Level 3
• Complex Assistive Technology – Level 4.

Details relating to Assistive Technology will be listed in the Capital budget of your NDIS plan.

Comprehensive reporting for NDIS participants is a fundamental requirement of the NDIS. Functional Capacity and Needs Assessments (FCNA) and reporting is provided to identify and document funding, therapeutic and care needs for NDIS participants.

Assessing one’s function in performing Activities of Daily Living (ADL) is a critical component in determining their independence and, more importantly, what level of support and/or assistance they may require to perform those activities from day to day. At OT Mackay, we have extensive experience in undertaking functional capacity and needs assessment, including the use of standardised assessment tools such as the Functional Independence Measure (FIM), World Health Organisation Disability Scale (WHO- DAS 2.0), Adaptive Behaviour Assessment System (ABAS), Vineland Adaptive Behaviour Scale, Life Skills Profile (LSP-16).

Other reporting services:

• FCNA – Functional Capacity and Needs Assessment and Reporting.
• SIL – Supported Independent Living Assessment and Reporting.
• SDA – Special Disability Accommodation Assessment and Reporting.
• Capacity Building Reporting.
• PNAR – Participant Needs Assessment Report (NIISQ).
• ACSR – Attendant Care and Support Request (NIISQ).