Question
I am interested in spinal cord injuries. I was wondering if there are any occupational therapy assessments that can be done to determine how functional someone with a spinal cord injury will be.

Answer
Hi Erin-

Yes, there are occupational assesments... I did some of them when asking the Texas Rehab Commission to help pay for my college. I'm not sure that they are only used for spinal cord injuries though.

I guess the answer depends on how you mean 'functional'- if you mean what physical abilities they will have, there are tests for that. But what i've found is that 2 people with the same injury may live very different lives (I mean that what you 'can' do at some point becomes a matter of your problem solving abilities and how stubborn you are by nature- I've done alot of things just because I'm 'mule-headed', as my father would tell you...)

And i know of no test for mule-headedness.
=)
If you're looking for specific tests,  google "rehabilitation occupational assessment .org" --you'll get a bunch of links to various occupational therapy sites.
I'm not sure if I've answered your question entirely, so please write in again if i can tell you anything else
thanks
leslie




Let me begin by saying though that there are really 2 things (my opinion) that affect how functional someone is after injury- their physical abilities and their mental abilities (by which I mean how they think about things, their personality- that make sense?