Active Occupation
Activities in which people engage as part as their life's roles, including personal care; the constructional tasks that involve the use of hand and mechanical tools; technological activities involving such tools as calculators, computers, and electronics; games of various sorts; and vocational skills.
Activity of Daily Living
Tasks that include self-care, functional mobility, communication, sexual activity, and sleep/rest.
Adaptive Approaches
Training in daily living behaviors to facilitate adaptation to the client's unique contextual environment.
Ataxia
The inability to purposefully coordinate one's muscles.
Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder - ADHD
A common developmental and behavioral disorder. It is characterized by poor concentration, distractibility, hyperactivity, and impulsiveness that are inappropriate for the child's age. Children and adults with ADHD are easily distracted by sights and sounds in their environment, cannot concentrate for long periods of time, are restless and impulsive, or have a tendency to daydream and be slow to complete tasks.
Bilateral Coordination Skills
The ability to use both sides of the body in a smooth, coordinated manner. Some activities that may be affected by difficulties with upper body bilateral coordination are stabilizing the paper while writing and using a ruler and stencils
Body Awareness
Is the ability to receive and interpret sensations coming from your muscles and joints. Your brain uses this information to discover where your body parts are and how they move through space. Good body awareness allows us to coordinate and move our body parts without looking at them.
For example, children use their sense of body awareness to tell how much force they would need to use to lift a heavy object, hang onto a pencil, or to sit upright in their desks without falling out.
Catheter
Plastic tubing used to remove urine from the bladder when the client is unable to satisfactorily control retention or release.
Cognition
Cognition is a term that is used to refer to intelligence, problem solving, reasoning, attention, and memory. Occupational therapy works with people who have had a change, or have a delay with the above. OT will work with a patient to gain or find a strategy or technique to assist a person with the above in order to be independent as possible.
Compensatory Strategies
Activities designed to compensate for or to offset a deficiency.
Down Syndrome
The syndrome is also known as Trisomy 21 syndrome. It is a congenital condition resulting from a defect in a person's Chromosome 21. Children & adults with Down's Syndrome frequently have lower than normal muscle tone, joints that are loose or lax, & often have a lower level of intelligence.
Egocentric realm
The occupational therapist's refind knowledge of what contributes to a client's performance in all aspets of the mind and body; such factors include motor, neurological, perceptual-cognitive, and emotional skills.
Endotracheal tube
A catheter inserted through the nose or mouth into the trachea usually used to deliver gas by the ventilator.
Escharotomy
Incision through the necrotic burned tissue performed to release the binding effect of the tight eschar, relieve the interstitial pressure, and restore distal circulation.
Exacerbation
An episode in the progression of multiple sclerosis as minor as fatigue and sensory loss or as extensive as total paralysis in all extremities and loss of bladder control.
Fine Motor Skills
The skilled use of one's hands. It is the ability to move the hands and fingers in a smooth, precise and controlled manner. Fine motor control is essential for efficient handling of classroom tools and materials. It may also be referred to as dexterity.
Finger Isolation
The ability to move one finger at a time. When children start to use their hands, all fingers move at the same time. However as they grow & develop, they begin to be able to move individual fingers. This ability is very important in the development of fine motor skills. It contributes to developing an efficient pencil grasp, being able to fasten & unfasten buttons, & cut with scissors.
Flaccidity
The absence of muscle tone.
Gelling
Morning stiffness (of less than 30 minutes' duration) and stiffness after periods of inactivity.
Goniometer
Angle-measuring device consisting of a body, a stationary (proximal) bar, and a movable (distal) bar.
Gross Motor Skills
Coordinated body movements involving the large muscle groups. A few activities requiring this skill include running, walking, hopping, climbing, throwing and jumping.
Hyper/Hypo-tomia
Hyper/Hypo-tomia refers to the amount of tension in a muscle at rest. Hypertonia is greater than normal tension & hypotonia is less than normal tension. The presence of either can greater affect one's ability to move & coordinate their muscles.
Keloid scar
Large, irregular-shaped scar caused by excessive collagen formation.
Kinesthesia
The sense that detects body position, weight, or movement of the muscles, tendons and joints.
Knee immobilizer
Prosthesis used to provide no range of motion in the knee following surgery.
Laminality
The observation that people white disability have the social experience of pervasive exclusion from ordinary life, the denial of full humanity, and a lack of full societal membership.
Locked-in-Syndrome
Locked-In syndrome is a condition in which a patient is aware and awake, but cannot move or communicate due to complete paralysis of nearly all voluntary muscles in the body. It is the result of a brain stem lesion in which the ventral part of the pons is damaged. The condition has been described as "the closest thing to being buried alive".
Lymphedema
An inflammatory response of the body that is caused by a shifting of protein-rich white blood cells flooding the area where the cancer has spread or where there is scan tissue forming.
Motor Control
Control of both movement and posture. Can refer to selective control and the relationship between stability & mobility, agonist and antagonist, and proximal & distal musculature.
Neuro-Developmental Treatment (NDT)
The use of manual cues for recovering functional use of components of movement.
Neuroma
A small ball of nerve tissue that develops when growing axons attempt to reach the distal end of the residual limb.
Normal Tone
High enough to resist gravity, low enough to allow for movement.
Objective activity analysis
Analysis of sensorimotor requirements of activities of daily living.
Occupational Therapy
Occupational Therapy (OT) is an applied science and health profession that provides skilled treatment to help individuals achieve and maintain independence in all facets of their lives. OT gives people the "skills for the job of living" necessary for independent and satisfying lives.
Oculomotor control
Eye movements completed quickly and accurately to ensure perceptual stability.
Orthosis
Splints and suspension arm devices used to compensate for bone deformity or bone-deforming forces.
Paresis
Slight or incomplete paralysis or weakness.
Pathogen
Infectious microorganism.
Praxis
The ability to plan and perform purposeful movement.
Proprioception
The unconscious perception of movement and spatial orientation arising from stimuli within joints and muscles.
Quality of life
An individual's judgment of self as measured by factors such as health, satisfaction, self-concept, and socioeconomic measures.
Range of motion
The amount of movement that is possible at a joint.
Remission
An episode in the progression of multiple sclerosis that may improve a total resolution of the symptoms, may result in a short plateau, or may result in some loss of function.
Self regulation
The ability to attain, maintain, and change level of alertness appropriately for a task or situation.
Sensory Integration
The organization of sensation for use. The central nervous system receives, filters, organizes and integrates stimuli in order for an individual to make an "adaptive response".
Splinting
Application of an immobilizing device.
Stroke rehabilitation
Stroke rehabilitation is the process by which patients with disabling strokes undergo treatment to help them return to normal life as much as possible by regaining and relearning the skills of everyday living. It is multidisciplinary in the fact that it involves a team with different skills working together to help the patient. These include nursing staff, physiotherapy, occupational therapy, speech and language therapy and usually a physician trained in rehabiliation medicine. Some teams may also include psychologists and social workers and pharmacists.
Vestibular
Sensation from the influence of gravity and movement.
Visual Motor Skills
The ability to visually take in information, process it and be able to coordinate your physical movement in relation to what has been viewed. It involves the combination of visual perception and motor coordination. Difficulty with visual motor skills can result in inaccurate reaching, pointing and grasping of objects, as well as difficulty with copying, drawing, tracing and cutting.
Visual-motor integration
The degree to which visual perception and finger-hand movements are well coordinated. Visual-motor integration is commonly measured by copying shapes.
Weight-bearing restrictions
The amount of level of weight that a patient is allowed to place on fracture sites.
A class of soft injuries affecting the muscles, tendons, and nerves.
Xenograft
Surgical burn intervantion using processed porcine skin.
