Aims
The Occupational Therapy programme offered by Brunel University London aims to prepare you to become a competent occupational therapist equipped for lifelong, safe and effective practice in a variety of health and social care settings. We provide a high quality educational programme, which ensures that you are properly qualified, prepared and safe to practise.
Occupational therapy students typically choose this career for the following reasons:
- variety of work
- the challenge
- personal and one-to-one contact
- client/patient appreciation
- its holistic approach
- the desire to help disabled people
- to work in health settings
- job availability
- the chance to be creative.
Employability
Brunel occupational therapy graduates continue to find employment both as occupational therapists or in other posts within the care sector. In many areas of health and social care provision, roles are diversifying from traditional hospital-based employment as a Band 5 occupational therapists to community-based Re-ablement teams. A BSc Occupational Therapy degree enables graduates to work in many areas: physical rehabilitation, mental health settings, with children in schools or in clinics and with people with learning disabilities, to name a few.
There are several aspects of the undergraduate programme which directly benefit the studentÕs employability as a graduate occupational therapist. A final year module ÒProfessional PracticeÓ examines the history and context of the graduateÕs potential employers, such as the National Health Service, local authorities and other areas of service provision. Topics such as continuing professional development, preparing for interviews and developing a personal statement are addressed in this module. Throughout the course a strong emphasis is placed on development of professional competence and professional identity.
Post qualification, the normal route for employment as an occupational therapist is registration with the UK Health Professions Council which licences all paramedical and professional jobs allied to health. Many graduate occupational therapists begin their career with a Preceptorship, which provides mentoring for the first months of new graduateÕs life as a professional.
Careers and your future
Occupational therapy has developed rapidly over the past decade and there are opportunities to work in the health and social care sector with people of all ages and all types of disability. More recently, the profession has seen rapid development in the voluntary sector, private practice, schools, prisons and industry.
Future developments are likely to be in vocational rehabilitation, medico-legal practice, forensic mental health, and health promotion.
