Occupational Therapist

Job Code: 32000637
Salary Grade: MH17
Revision Date: 06/2018

Class Concept

This is highly skilled rehabilitative work with patients whose abilities to cope with tasks of living are threatened or impaired by developmental deficiencies, the aging process, poverty or cultural differences, physical injury or illness, sensory modulation dysregulation, or psychological and social disability. Employees serve as therapists in a State institution. Work involves initial evaluation of physician referred patients through interaction, behavioral assessments, sensory testing, perceptual testing and/or anatomical and functional examination depending on the disability, and in designing and implementing a treatment plan that is rehabilitatively specific for each patient. Duties in the psychosocial area include the design and implementation of programs that include but are limited to mental health recovery programming, coping skill development, sensory modulations, adaptive living, instrumental activities of daily living, education, work, play, leisure, social interactions, technology training, violence prevention, restraint reduction, self-injurious behavior reduction, monitoring of adaptive devices/tools, staff trainings, and return to community following prolonged institutionalization training skills that restore or improve their performance capacities in life tasks and situations. Responsibilities in physical dysfunction area include evaluating patients to determine the degree of physical deficits and implementing a program to improve the patient's ability to function which may include the design, fabrication, fitting, and instruction of a variety of dynamic, static or functional splints, or adaptive equipment and hands on rehabilitation of the physiological impairment, use of physical agent modalities, range of motion programs and strength training, compensatory techniques, and activities of daily living. Duties in the developmental disabilities area include evaluation through standardized and/or formal testing procedures and behavioral assessments and designing and implementing a treatment program specific to the evaluative findings to habilitate or rehabilitate the patient's deficiencies that will improve their functioning. Responsibilities of employees in all areas include reporting patient progress in medical conferences, multi-disciplinary team meeting; recording in patient's chart and department records, and may include the supervision of supportive staff. Therapists provide hospital unit, hospital wide trainings, recovery festival, and community trainings. Work is reviewed and evaluated by the occupational therapy supervisor, physicians, administrative supervisor, or medical directors through personal observation of work, analysis of reports, periodic conferences, and as evidenced by patient progress.

Recruitment Requirements

Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities

• Considerable knowledge of the principles, techniques, and methods of occupational therapy as applicable to patients with psycho-social dysfunctions and sensory modulation dysfunction.
• Working knowledge of functional anatomy, physiology, and skeletal biomechanics, whichever applicable area of work.
• Working knowledge of the psychiatric aspects of various mental handicaps and disabilities.
• Skill in the design and fabrication of a variety of splints and self-help devices rehabilitatively specific to individual patients with bodily injury and skill in the design of craft and interactional treatment programs rehabilitatively specific in a variety of individual cases.
• Skills in general craft techniques for enhancement of physical and psychiatric functioning.
• Skill in wheelchair modification for least restrictive interventions and physiologically supportive to individual.
• Skill in restraint reduction, self-injury prevention, and least restrictive environment development.
• Ability to evaluate patient response and progress and to present evaluative reports in case staffing and multi-disciplined team meetings.
• Ability to work effectively with patients, patients' families, medical nursing, and other staff members and to deal tactfully with the public and ability to perform light to moderate physical exertion..
• Ability to develop and present information for recovery model enhancement.

Minimum Education and Experience

Licensed to practice as an Occupational Therapist in the State of North Carolina.