About the DEx

"The Accreditation Council for Occupational Therapists (ACOTE) requires entry-level Occupational Therapy programs culminate in a Doctoral Capstone. At WNE, the Doctoral Capstone is referred to as the Doctoral Experiential (DEx). Each OTD student works with a faculty mentor and a community partner (site mentor) to create a multi-faceted individualized capstone project. Each DEx is planned over a two-year period and conducted during the final 14 weeks of the OTD program. The purpose of the Doctoral Experiential is for students to apply the knowledge and skills gained during their OTD academic courses and their Level I and II fieldwork experiences in ways that challenge and perhaps transform the delivery of health, educational, and social services.

The WNE OTD Doctoral Experiential has two components. One, a community experiential, involves completing 14 weeks, or 560 hours at a community organization. Community organizations include hospitals, clinics, schools, health care, social service, advocacy, or educational organizations. While there, students will learn about the population and setting, the organization’s strengths and challenges, and will participate in daily activities. While there, they will also conduct a scholarly project designed to answer a question generated from a needs assessment, literature review and collaboration with faculty, site and peer mentors. The intention of both the community experiential and the scholarly project are to establish a meaningful connection between University and community, to improve health, education, and social services, and to explore potentially transformative roles for occupational therapists."

-Western New England University Doctoral Experiential Manual

To read more about the DEx, please reference the Western New England University Doctoral Experiential Manual located at the bottom of this page.

The Implications of Tools and Client-Centered Interventions to Address Work-Related Pain in Outpatient Manual Therapists

Workplace injuries can occur in any and all kinds of settings, and health care is no exception. Manual therapists, such as Occupational Therapists (OTs) and Physical Therapists (PTs), tend to succumb to work-related musculoskeletal disorders (WMSDs) which affect the soft tissues of the body. These type of injuries can also be referred to as overuse injuries, cumulative trauma injuries, or repetitive strain injuries. Workplace injuries in healthcare are extremely prevalent, with research indicating that up to 91% of PTs experience WMSDs and pain (Darragh, Huddleston, & King, 2009). The most commonly reported sources of work-related injury (WRI) among healthcare workers are patient handling (transfers, repositioning and patient lifting) and manual therapy (soft tissue work, joint mobilization, and orthopedic techniques) (Darragh, Campo, & King, 2012).

These types of injuries occur in healthcare practitioners who utilize manual therapy techniques in practice, which include, but are not limited to, OTs, PTs, certified hand therapists (CHTs), massage therapists, chiropractors, athletic trainers, and other specialization areas such as certified lymphedema specialists. For this study, a manual therapist will be defined as a healthcare practitioner who utilizes manipulative therapy in treatment services. Research and studies on this area are new and minimal, even though studies that have been conducted show a prevalence rate of work-related injuries in manual therapists that are seen in heavy manufacturing (Darragh, Huddleston, & King, 2009).

Work-related pain affects therapists in several personal and professional domains, and strategies to reduce the risk of injury and physical loading of jobs are needed (Campo & Darragh, 2010). Educating therapists on techniques, tools, and ergonomics will decrease the likelihood of injuries occurring. Identifying client-centered techniques and tools for manual therapists will create preventative strategies tailored to the specific needs and preferences of the therapist while also addressing their work-related pain and injury.

The ePortfolio is defined as “a digital collection of authentic and diverse evidence, drawn from a larger archive, that represents what a person . . . has learned over time and on which the person . . . has reflected, designed for presentation to one or more audiences for a particular rhetorical purpose” by The European Institute for E-Learning (Kardos et al., 2009, p. 136). This ePortfolio was developed as a part of my Doctoral Experiential project to showcase my work on the implications of tools and client-centered interventions to prevent work-related pain and injury in manual therapists, as well as to serve as evidence of meeting my project objectives.

Due to the ongoing effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, this project was completed in a hybrid format in order to follow local, state, and federal protocols, procedures, regulations, and restrictions. Necessary changes to this project were made in order to ensure safety precautions are met throughout the entirety of the Doctoral Experiential project.

Please click below to view our poster presentation for both conferences.