Reablement Occupational Therapist

Norfolk First Support – Northern

Adult Social Care

I qualified as an occupational therapist in 2020 from the University of East Anglia. I have had experience working within the NHS as a community occupational therapist in a rehabilitation team. I currently work within adult social care in a reablement service, which is very rewarding. This team is part of Norfolk First Support (NFS) and in January 2021 the new occupational therapy team was recruited to join NFS. The purpose of this team is to support individuals to regain as much independence as possible to prevent, reduce or delay their need for ongoing support and also empower individuals to be in control over their health and wellbeing. I am really excited to join the SCRiPT project and conduct research around the topic of reablement with the intention of developing the existing service to maximise outcomes for people.

Exploring the effectiveness of OT reablement services in increasing independence among residents

This study is going to explore whether the Morriston Occupational Therapy Outcome Measure (MOTOM) is an appropriate outcome measure for reablement services.

Reablement is defined by the Department of Health and Social Care (2022) as “services that help people live independently, provided in the person’s own home by a team of mainly social care professionals.” The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE), explain what reablement should consist of through the Intermediate Care Including Reablement guidelines. However, legislation does not dictate how local authorities should deliver this. It is important to consider whether the outcome measures chosen in services could restrict or facilitate the delivery of guidelines in practice.

Through a literature search, it has become apparent that different local authorities utilise different outcome measures in reablement services. Whitehead et al (2016) stated that ‘the National Audit for Intermediate Care has also previously reported much debate when agreeing which outcome measure to use for home-based intermediate care and reablement services.’

The MOTOM was created in 1993 and was designed to facilitate discharges from hospital to home. The MOTOM was selected to be used for the reablement team in Norfolk. However, the MOTOM’s use in a community context or within local authorities has not yet been explored, this research hopes to achieve this.

To answer this research question, service providers who work from, write and approve the assessment will be consulted. Through a community of practice, two questionnaires have been designed for the service providers using the MOTOM to explore whether they feel this is appropriate for reablement services and adheres to the guidelines of how this should be delivered.