NIDILRR ARRT Fellows: Toward a global strategy for strengthening occupational therapy workforce worldwide: a Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats (SWOT) analysis.
Postdoctoral fellow Center for Education in Health Sciences, Institute for Public Health and Medicine, Feinberg School of Medicine, Northwestern University Chicago, Illinois, United States
Research Objectives: To perform a situational assessment of the research on the occupational therapy (OT) workforce worldwide toward informing the development of a global workforce strategy endorsed by the World Federation of Occupational Therapists (WFOT).
Design: Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats (SWOT) analysis derived from a multi-pronged scoping review of the OT workforce research previously published, current workforce development frameworks, and experts’ feedback.
Setting: Videoconferencing and written experts’ feedback on a draft SWOT analysis
Participants: Key informants (n = 6) who included OT workforce researchers and human resource scholars, with representation across regions and countries of varying income levels.
Interventions: Not applicable.
Main Outcome Measures: Not applicable.
Results: Strengths included OT workforce research trends and gaps identified within and across nation types. Weaknesses included lack of uniform and readily available OT workforce datasets, a shortage of workforce research, over-reliance on descriptive and non-experimental research, under-researched topics worldwide (e.g., diversity) and in specific countries (e.g., rural workforce recruitment and retention in the USA). Opportunities included the availability of tools for strengthening the OT workforce worldwide, and increased membership from low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) in the WFOT. Threats included substandard funding of OT workforce research compared to broader health workforce research, lack of educational capacity in LMICs, and lack of professional regulation and uniform workforce data collection in many country contexts.
Conclusions: This situational analysis identified the development needs for strengthening of the global OT workforce to meet high and increasing population needs. Informed by this SWOT analysis, a global OT workforce strategy is under development by the WFOT.
Author(s) Disclosures: No conflicts of interest declared
Learning Objectives:
To describe NIDILRR's Advanced Rehabilitation Research Training (ARRT) Program.
To discuss cutting-edge research conducted by ARRT fellows.
To consider application of research findings to one's clinical practice or research activities.
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