The development of competencies for Occupational Therapists (OTs) working across health and social care in Glasgow City HSCP has again been highlighted as an example of good practice, with a feature in the August 2020 edition of OT News. This is a membership only publication from the Royal College of Occupational Therapists.

Dorothy Rae, Mental Health Care Group Lead Occupational Therapist for Glasgow City HSCP was interviewed by the magazine for the article, which highlights the engagement of staff in the development of the competencies and their contribution to leaner service provision for OTs in the HSCP.

The service was also featured in the February 2020 edition of Glasgow City HSCP’s Newsletter.  Here is the story.

Implementing the Occupational Therapy Review

The Review and Reform of Occupational Therapy within Glasgow City HSCP (2016) identified that established role boundaries had resulted in frequent instances where a service user would see more than one OT during a single care episode, and was being referred between OTs in different care groups.

As a result, the Review recommended that there should be a focus on defining the core and specialist roles of OTs working in both health and social care, to allow the identification of tasks that could become shared across care groups and develop a framework for implementing these in practice.

A Competency and Practice Subgroup, led by Hilary Bell, Care Group Lead OT, progressed this work, identifying training needs and areas of practice change.

Three care groups were identified as the initial focus of this work – Social Care, Health Rehabilitation and Older Adult Mental Health Teams.

Through a series of staff engagement events shared competencies were drafted as a framework, to allow staff in all care groups to take on tasks previously only undertaken within one care group. These draft competencies were piloted with a small group of staff in each locality of the city.

Results showed significant reduction in onward referral between OTs. Significant in the success of this work were the working links between OT staff in the different care groups. Staff are now working in ‘professional triangles’ to support one another in taking on newer tasks.

Seven launch events to roll out the implementation of the competencies across all OTs in the three care groups were held between October and December 2019. Attendees highlighted some of the main benefits from introducing these competencies as:

•    streamlining the service for service users, reducing waiting times
•    aligning services to avoid duplication of work and
•    increased job satisfaction.

When asked how they now viewed their role in taking competencies forward participants said:
•    ‘To shadow colleagues and increase my knowledge in extending my role’ and
•    ‘To be a resource to other colleagues working in extended roles.’

The subgroup continues to support and review the implemented competencies and is moving to engage with further care groups.

More information from Dorothy Rae, email dorothy.rae2@ggc.scot.nhs.uk