Mobile phone technology has become an integral part of peoples' lives. It has changed how we interact with each other and how we access information. This article describes how mobile phone use, in particular text messaging, has been used to communicate with and support students with mental health problems attending a university within Ireland to manage their academic and social lives. This study was descriptive, non-experimental, and predominantly qualitative in nature. It employed a mixed-method approach, by way of: (1) Collecting text messaging data, relating to 40 students, from four therapists across three years, and (2) auditing the service files to gather demographic data and some intervention-related information that was cross-analyzed with the qualitative text messaging data. Thematic analysis of the data using QSR N6 produced five over-arching themes: practicalities around appointments; condition=illness thanks, but I'm fine; progress-both academic and personal; and nontherapeutic interaction. This study showed that text messaging with a student population using a mental health support service was valuable. It offered a means of maintaining ongoing contact between the service users and the staff and acted not only as a means for receiving and giving information but as a means of maintaining the on-going therapeutic relationship.
A sample of 76 Irish girls and boys of about 9 years of age, for whom neonatal (birthweight, Apgar and Neonatal Behavioural Assessment Scale) and infancy measures (Bayley Infant Scales at 18 months) were available, were administered the Bruininks-Oseretsky Test of Motor Proficiency (BOTMP). The main focus of this paper is on a longitudinal analysis of the relationships between the neonatal and infancy measures and the BOTMP administered at about 9 years. However, since the literature expresses some doubts about the basis of the division of the BOTMP subtests into fine motor and gross motor groups and about the meaningfulness of the overall battery score, an initial statistical analysis was undertaken to examine these construct validity issues with this sample of children. This analysis indicated that the division of subtests into fine motor and gross motor skills groups, as formulated by the BOTMP, is not supported. The longitudinal analysis, therefore, focused mainly on subtest scores and provided some evidence of a degree of continuity in measured motor proficiency between birth, 18 months and the prepubertal period. Continuity was more evident for female children.
Accessible summary• Some children with disabilities go to special preschools where adults help them play.• The adults who work in preschools sometimes ask occupational therapists for advice to help children play more.• Occupational therapists need to know how children play when not helped by adults.• This study videoed children playing both with lots of toys and without toys to see how they chose to play.
SummaryWithin the Republic of Ireland, young children with learning disabilities may attend special preschools where they do not share any part of their day with typically developing children. Within these settings, preschool staff support children's play. Clinicians such as occupational therapists may be called upon to assist in progressing their play. To provide appropriate recommendations, occupational therapists must have a clear understanding of what play a child with learning disabilities engages in when not supported by adults. Occupational therapy literature described play as the most common occupation of children with a focus on process-driven activity. This may be at odds with a model of early intervention, where play is often product-driven, with the end goal in mind. The aim of this research was to establish what free play, if any, children with learning disabilities engage in when not supported by adults in an Irish preschool setting. Secondly, this study sought to describe what behaviours these children engage in when they were not playing. Finally, this study sought to establish inter-rater reliability of the Revised Know Preschool Play Scale with this small sample. Systematic observation was used to explore the play and nonplay behaviours of the children involved. A convenience sample was used to identify five children to participate in the study. Results indicated that children engaged in free play within the sensory motor stage of development, as assessed using the Revised Knox Preschool Play Scale. They alsoThe Official Journal of the British Institute of Learning Disabilities spent significant time in nonplay behaviours. The behaviour patterns of the children and time spent in different activities were explored.
Occupational therapists must generate knowledge and evidence that relates specifically to their practice context especially when there is a paucity of literature for emerging areas of practice. This paper describes the process of adopting a scholarship of practice approach with other professionals to generate evidence for practice in mainstream post primary school settings with students with social, emotional and behavioral difficulties (SEBD). Scholarship of practice and clinical reasoning are closely intertwined as therapists generate evidence on their practice to make informed decisions and judgments. In this paper, there are a number of important concepts needing to be highlighted for their meaning in this specific context.
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