Occupational Therapist Involvement in Older Driver Safety Grant uri icon

abstract

  • Using NHTSA Highway Safety Program Guideline #13 as a "roadmap," the overall objective of this procurement is to engage occupational therapists in a range of contexts and settings order to meet the recommendations for supporting older driver safety, the role of driver licensing and medical providers under this specific guideline. This shall include: 1) Using resources, previously developed, to build pathways of knowledge, skills, and abilities that lead to increased numbers of occupational therapy practitioners the general practice level to address driving and community mobility. Projects will inform and support AOTA's exploration of expanded outreach options including expanding specialty certification and exploration into the feasibility of adding a specialty certificate. (Certification is the AOTA is the responsibility of the credentialing committee, therefore engaging a greater circle of leaders and influencers in the occupational therapy profession is warranted). An option such as a professional certificate may offer incentive for practitioners to pursue a leadership role within their program or facility as mid-level experts, adding a level of expertise complimentary to the highly trained specialist in driver rehabilitation in the area of driving and community mobility. These pathways will offer guidance-building networks with significant stakeholders such as physicians, medical licensing agencies, and other stakeholder groups. 2) Creating training and educational opportunities that emphasize ethics and D&CM at the different levels of practice. The Ethics Module already developed and available (previous NHTSA/AOTA cooperative agreement) will be integrated into newly created toolkits for occupational therapy students, general practitioners and for those seeking certification. This toolkit will include a framework for building a leadership/mentoring pathway. Development of leaders is a clear need and several tasks of this work will actively recruit, educate and empower occupational therapy leadership in D&CM in a range of geographic and work settings. 3) Creating "good" practice pathway models incorporating evidence based training and educational tools/ materials so occupational therapists can integrate driving and community mobility options into their practice for both evaluation and intervention. These models will be two-fold; at the practitioner level, meeting general practice therapists at their state level and at a programmatic level, generating models for at least four types of settings, typical across the states. 4) Evaluation of practitioner behavior change after the implementation of the education and training. This evaluation will contribute to the understanding of the components that supported the expansion of occupational therapist addressing driving and community mobility, components not as useful, and identifying future projects to consider. The modification will add a demonstration project. 5) The modification will add increased emphasis on awareness of occupational therapy's role in driving and community mobility with the development of videos, public facing for awareness of the practice and professional facing to build awareness of occupational therapy's contribution to the tram.

date/time interval

  • July 2018 - October 2020