Murray-Mendes Savannah, Martinez Anastasia Raquel, Hackett Katie L
Department of Social Work Education and Community Wellbeing, Northumbria University, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK.
Department of Occupational Therapy, Department of Occupational Therapy, Maracas/St. Joseph, Trinidad and Tobago.
Occup Ther Int. 2021 Oct 12;2021:9970566. doi: 10.1155/2021/9970566. eCollection 2021.
In Trinidad and Tobago, occupational therapy is an emerging profession with limitations in the number of practitioners and the scope of practice. With the development of a new Master of Science Occupational Therapy programme in the country, the profession is continuously growing. There has been an increased demand for culturally relevant research to build the occupational therapy evidence base locally. However, the narrow range of occupational therapy literature in the country makes it difficult to highlight research gaps and decipher what research areas should be prioritised to best impact occupational therapy practice at present. This group concept mapping study is aimed at identifying priority areas for occupational therapy research in Trinidad and Tobago from the perspectives of occupational therapy students and practitioners. Participants brainstormed and contributed specific research ideas they would like to see developed in the country. Individually, participants sorted these ideas into themes and rated each idea based on perceived importance and feasibility. Using the GroupWisdom™ software, multidimensional scaling and hierarchical cluster analyses were applied to the sort data to create idea clusters within a concept map. Rating values were analysed to determine priority research themes within the concept map. The resulting concept map illustrated seven research priorities: Contextualising Practitioner Development, The Realities of Emerging OT Practice, Localising Mental Health OT, Occupation and Participation of Children and Youth, School-based OT in the Local Context, OT with Special Populations, and OT Contributions to the Public Health Sector. These findings represent the research needs of the occupational therapy profession in Trinidad and Tobago and will help to focus future researchers' efforts to expand the local evidence base.
在特立尼达和多巴哥，职业治疗是一个新兴专业，从业者数量和业务范围都存在限制。随着该国新的职业治疗理学硕士课程的开展，这个专业在持续发展。对于开展与文化相关的研究以在当地建立职业治疗证据基础的需求日益增加。然而，该国职业治疗文献的范围较窄，这使得难以突出研究差距，也难以解读目前哪些研究领域应被优先考虑，以对职业治疗实践产生最大影响。这项群体概念映射研究旨在从职业治疗专业学生和从业者的角度确定特立尼达和多巴哥职业治疗研究的优先领域。参与者进行头脑风暴，并提出他们希望在该国开展的具体研究想法。参与者各自将这些想法归类为主题，并根据感知到的重要性和可行性对每个想法进行评分。使用GroupWisdom™软件，对排序后的数据应用多维缩放和层次聚类分析，以在概念图中创建想法集群。对评分值进行分析，以确定概念图中的优先研究主题。由此产生的概念图展示了七个研究重点：从业者发展的情境化、新兴职业治疗实践的现实情况、心理健康职业治疗的本地化、儿童和青少年的活动与参与、当地背景下的学校职业治疗、针对特殊人群的职业治疗以及职业治疗对公共卫生部门的贡献。这些研究结果代表了特立尼达和多巴哥职业治疗专业的研究需求，并将有助于集中未来研究人员的精力，以扩大当地的证据基础。
