MCC CELEBRATES OT MONTH

OCCUPATIONAL THERAPY HELPS INDIVIDUALS LIVE LIFE TO ITS FULLEST!

In celebration of April as Occupational Therapy (OT) Month, students in Madisonville Community College s Occupational Therapy Assistant program are working to educate the community about their profession. Occupational therapy enables people of all ages to live life to its fullest by helping them promote health, prevent and/or live better with injury, illness, or disability. Therapists and assistants focus on doing whatever occupations or activities are meaningful to the individual. It is occupational therapy s purpose to get beyond the problems and to the solutions that assure living life to its fullest. These solutions may be adaptations for how to do a task, changes to the surroundings, or helping individuals to alter their own behaviors.

By taking the full picture into account a person s psychological, physical, emotional, and social makeup as well as their environment occupational therapy assists clients to achieve goals, function at the highest possible level, concentrate on what matters most to them, maintain or rebuild their independence, and participate in daily activities that they need or want to do.

Students gave back to the community with health and wellness promotions for adults at the Madisonville Regional Senior Citizens Center, the Muhlenberg County Senior Citizens Center, The Oaks Personal Care Home, and The Paragon of Madisonville. Topics addressed were fall preventions, CarFit, nutritionally health food choices, relaxation, and Aging in Place. Students also presented career education programs at Muhlenberg County High School, Butler County Vocational Technical School, and participated in Operation Preparation at Ohio County High School. To further promote OT month and the program, students staffed an information table in the Student Center on MCC s North Campus and recorded the MCC amp; You heard locally on WFMW radio and Saturday and Sunday mornings.

Additional information about MCC s Occupational Therapy Assistant program can be found on the college s website at madisonville.kctcs.edu.