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Maintain core tasks or lose them altogether, conference warned
OTs need to consider what tasks the profession should focus on to avoid losing responsibilities for their core tasks, the annual conference heard today.

Avril Drummond, associate professor in rehabilitation at the University of Nottingham, delivering the Elizabeth Casson Memorial Lecture, argued that OTs are good at finding gaps in services and meeting need, but that they could not work in all fields. She suggested that the profession needed to stay in touch with tasks such as helping to wash and dress in hospitals and providing equipment and adaptations in the home, or risk losing responsibility for them altogether.

She said: ‘We need a strategy for the future and we need to be clear what our roles are. We can’t keep adding to what we do, we’ve got to focus on our core skills and we’ve got to make sure we’ve got everyone with us.’

She used the example of Lehman Brothers, the banking giant that failed after drifting away from their core banking business, to show the risks of diversifying away from traditional OT roles.

She added: ‘Make no mistake about it, if we’re not doing them and we turn our backs on these things that need to be done then others will move in to do them.’ 
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An occupational therapist at BAOT Annual Conference