Document Type

Capstone

Abstract

Anthropogenic environmental decline and associated climate change is causing negative health and wellness and consequently occupational injustices. As human activity continues to be the largest contributing factor to environmental degradation, sustainability practices are essential now more than ever to remediate ecological damages for the health, wellbeing, and occupational justice of current and future generations. Occupational therapy (OT) is an occupation-based profession and therefore implies a focus on human activity with an underlying responsibility to promote environmental sustainability. OT practitioners have a unique ability to support client engagement and participation in ecosystem conservation and sustainability. The purpose of this paper was to determine if a research-based educational in-service presentation can increase awareness of the health effects of environmental degradation and climate change, increase sustainability knowledge and values, and improve OT practitioner's engagement and participation in implementing environmentally informed care in clinical settings. A total of 12 rehabilitation professionals (eight OT practitioners) attended the presentation and were presented with pre- and post-surveys to be completed before and after the presentation in addition to a one-month follow-up self-assessment. The surveys included three identical questions administered on a Likert scale for comparison with two additional short-answer questions on the post-survey, composing a combination of quantitative and qualitative data to be analyzed. In conclusion, the collected data demonstrated an increase in awareness, knowledge, values, and engagement/participation in environmental sustainability among OT practitioners upon completion of the presentation. This evidence demonstrates the value of an educational in-service presentation for the improvement of environmentally informed care practices among OT practitioners.

Publication Date

4-20-2022

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