Date and Time: June 13, 2025 from 8:30 am - 3:30 pm
Location and Parking: Savaria Patient Care | 81 Romina Dr., Concord, ON L4K 4Z9 | Parking is free.
Workshop Description:
This workshop is back by popular demand and has been rated a five-star session by past attendees. We heard our members and are pleased to present it now in-person!
Occupational therapy professionals from the hospital, community, long-term care and private sectors will find this a meaningful and engaging professional development opportunity. Spaces are limited.
The upper extremity (UE) is often affected after a stroke or brain injury, which can contribute to reduced independence in the functional tasks that clients need or want to perform. Canadian Stroke Best Practices, 2024, indicate that clients need to engage in meaningful, repetitive, increasingly adaptive, and task specific goal-oriented therapy to maximize the potential of the UE. After a stroke or brain injury, it is often challenging to find a role for the more involved UE while performing functional tasks and knowing how to progress the functional reach of the UE.
This one-day workshop combines an occupational therapy perspective with NDT principles to focus on UE recovery. We will look at how to progress the UE, starting with using the more involved UE in active support and then progressing to reaching at lower ranges of shoulder flexion. We will explore practical tips to engage the UE in active support or in a modified functional reach while considering the client’s goals, occupations/tasks and environment.
Learning Opportunities: Thanks to our sponsor Savaria Patient Care, this workshop will be hosted at their site, which provides unique opportunities to participate in creative problem-solving with various materials and equipment and in different environments, throughout the space. We will begin with a lecture component, followed by interactive labs to aid in assessment and facilitation of the UE in active support and progressing to lower ranges of shoulder flexion. There will also be time to ask questions about products and equipment to further enhance your learning.
Requirements: Participants must be a registered occupational therapist or physiotherapist or an occupational therapist/physiotherapist assistant.
Workshop Agenda
After completing this workshop, you will be able to:
- Identify basic principles to assess trunk and UE alignment and impairment.
- Appreciate the benefits of using the more involved UE as an active support during functional tasks for clients after stroke or for clients who have neurological impairments.
- Understand the principles of how to progress into functional reaching of the upper extremity while considering the client’s impairments, goals/occupations, and the environment.
- Explore the physical environment in a different way to see how we can promote active support and functional reach while considering a client’s impairments.
- Learn basic handling skills to: get the UE in active support and to progress to functional reach at lower levels of shoulder flexion.
About Our Presenter:
Sherry Rock, OT Reg. (Ont.) is an occupational therapist who has worked in outpatient neuro rehabilitation clinical settings for over 22 years. She is the first Adult NDTA™ OT Instructor in Canada. She holds a Master of Clinical Science in Occupational Therapy from the University of Western Ontario. Sherry has experience working with clients with stroke and other neurological diagnoses in both outpatient and inpatient settings. Sherry has taken numerous NDT courses as well as various cognitive and perceptual courses related to acquired brain injuries. She continues to expand her knowledge in these areas as well as in the area of emotional well-being to help clients manage and cope with the life changes that have occurred.
Sherry believes it is important to create a comfortable learning environment in which we all have an opportunity to learn, practice and problem solve together. She has taught on many introductory, intermediate and certificate NDTA™ courses, as well as presented on topics related to cognition and perception at conferences in Ontario. Sherry completed her training to become an NDTA™ OT Instructor in 2018. Her passion is working collaboratively with clients with neurological conditions, their families, and other healthcare professionals to help clients maximize their independence in completing activities that are meaningful to them within their home and in the community.
Fees: (All fees are plus HST) Early Bird Deadline: May 23, 2025
Refund Policy
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