ABC Therapeutics Occupational Therapy Weblog

According to the NYS OT Board, supervision guidance for OTAs in NYS has been placed on hold, at least until the next Board Meeting. Of course the State Board wouldn't state why there are is no new supervision guidance - just that the previous regulations on supervision remain in effect. This is probably welcome news to many school districts who use models where a single OTR supervises many COTAs across a wide geographic area. It is my best guess that school districts would have found themselves in the very unfortunate position of being out of compliance with the new regs, which would have impacted their ability to receive Medicaid reimbursement, which would have likely cost hundreds of thousands of dollars if not more in lost revenue. So you see they HAD to pass these emergency regulations and bypass public comment, but I will do the State Board a favor and help them rewrite their justification (I also fixed their date errors from the letter to the Regents): Emergency action is ne...

Feb.6 letter from Doug Lentivech to the Professional Practice Committee of the NYS Board of Regents re: emergency regulations relating to OT Assistants, OT Students, and Limited Permittees. Here is the revised language of the regulation that allegedly will not be available to the public until after it is published in the New York State Administrative Register. This information was sent all over NY State today and was released by an Albany law firm who I assume must represent someone in the know. I can't state definitively that these are the final versions, but the state or national associations aren't releasing anything and this came from a reputable source so I am going on the assumption that these will be the final regulations. I encourage OT practitioners to contact the NYS Board for OT if they have questions about these (proposed??/accepted??) regulations. They presumably will be retroactive to today so OTs around the state will want to be aware of new requirements with as...

Quality indicators are monitored when public monies are used, such as for Public Law 108-446, the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) 2004. The act mandates that states develop and submit a six year State Performance Plan (SPP) to the government. For each of the quality indicators that states report on there has to be improvement activities and targets. The idea of all this is to drive improved quality within the system Quality indicator 7 for preschool services requires that a percent of preschool children with IEPs demonstrate improved positive social-emotional skills (including social relationships); acquisition and use of knowledge and skills (including early language/ communication and early literacy); and use of appropriate behaviors to meet their needs. Performance on this indicator is assessed using standardized tests after children have participated in their preschool program. The SPP requires that exit assessments only need to be conducted for preschool ch...

Earlier this week I noticed a large uptick in Google searches regarding early intervention that were landing on this blog so I started wondering what was going on. Turns out that there was a NYS Association of Counties meeting this week and the Department of Health gave a powerpoint presentation about the Governor's proposal. Copies of the powerpoint started to make their way around the State - and that got people doing some Internet searches for more information. Here is a link to the presentation for those who have not been able to see it yet. The powerpoint doesn't offer information that is materially different than what is already listed in the proposed budget but it is in a more readable format. The largest issues proposed include: 1. Providers will be approved through the Department of Health and won't have contracts with local municipalities. 2. There must be an arms length relationship between service coordinators, evaluators, and service providers. 3. Providers ...