A Step Ahead

Occupational Therapy


Occupational therapy benefits children who have delays in fine and gross motor skills, sensory processing, and self care skills.  If your child has difficulty with any of the following, occupational therapy can help.

  • Difficulty with coloring, cutting with scissors or other pre-school/kindergarten fine motor tasks.
  • Difficulty with academic tasks such as handwriting.  Unable to hold a pencil correctly or complains of hand pain and fatigue.
  • Unable to use utensils to eat, has trouble dressing self like others his/her age.
  • Reacts negatively to stimuli in the environment such as sounds, bright lights.  Doesn’t like messy play and may react negatively to touch. 
  • May only eat certain textures of foods.
  • Seeks out excessive sensory stimuli like swinging, spinning, roughhouse play or avoids them all the time.
  • Decreased attention and direction following

  • Placing inappropriate objects in mouth

Specialty evaluations and interventions provided for the following areas:

  • Activities of daily living
  • Fine and gross motor development.
  • Neonatal and infant development
  • Autism Spectrum Disorders
  • Feeding disorders/deficits
  • Sensory processing and sensory integration
  • Adaptive equipment, and positioning (feeding and dressing devices, writing utensil modifications, etc)
  • Visual motor, and visual perceptual skills.

  • Handwriting

Certification and extensive training:

  • Sequential Oral Sensory Approach (SOS) to feeding
  • NDT based treatment techniques
  • Handwriting Without Tears
  • Therapeutic Listening Program

 

What is Occupational Therapy?

Occupational therapy helps people of all ages to be more independent in activities of daily living, or ADLs. Any task that has meaning to someone is considered an ADL. Occupational therapy for the pediatric population helps children from birth through eighteen years of age. ADLs for children include eating, dressing, buttoning, tying shoes, playing with toys, handwriting, and using scissors. Occupational therapy also helps children who experience sensory dysfunction such as a lack of body and space perception or difficulty touching various textures. Often times, occupational therapy helps children who become upset in response to every day tasks such as cutting fingernails, washing hair, or eating different food textures. Children with and without special needs may experience difficulty with daily tasks and can benefit from occupational therapy.

What is an Occupational Therapist?

An occupational therapist is a licensed healthcare professional with a Masters degree in occupational therapy. When a child comes to work with an occupational therapist for the first time, a thorough evaluation of the child’s level of perform ace in critical developmental areas is performed and then a plan of treatment is developed. At A Step Ahead Pediatric Therapy, we believe that parental/caregiver involvement is goal setting and treatment planning is crucial to successful outcomes. We encourage parents and caregivers to attend therapy sessions and ask questions. During each treatment we provide modeling and offer helpful suggestions for carry-over at home.

Motor Milestones

 

For more information, e-mail Karyl Juergens at kjuergens@astepaheadpt.com.