Deinstitutionalizing the occupational therapist

This paper will discuss the problems behind the lack of occupational therapists working in the community. The paper will also describe a strategy used by a professional group in Portland, Oregon to increase the employment of occupational therapists in the community mental health field. This is not a research report but a description of a problem and of one way it was approached and solved. While this paper is concerned primarily with service delivery in the mental health arena, it is felt that the problems presented and the strategy for their resolution apply equally to other areas of practice in occupational therapy. It is the author's contention that with changing health care patterns occupational therapists in all areas of practice need to focus job search efforts more in community settings rather than in the traditional occupational therapy 'clinic' within hospitals and other residential institutions.