Interventions Across Work Settings

Depending upon the work setting, the ways in which PTs plan interventions and set goals can vary. However, some common principles apply.

  • Interventions should be planned collaboratively and should foster participation. Outcomes should always be measured.
  • Intervention may range from educational and other recommendations to blocks of direct intervention where a PT works with a child individually one-on-one.
  • Specific information to plan your interventions, depending on your work setting is found below. The Evidence-Based Practice and Management sections provide additional information.
What Planning Collaboratively, Fostering Participation and Evaluating Outcomes mean if you are...
If you are in private practice:
  • Plan collaboratively: Families come to you with specific concerns; listen, help them understand DCD, and identify meaningful goals with them. Think about leisure activities or community partners and resources the child might benefit from.
  • Foster participation: Provide intervention in the child's regular environments instead of in the clinic. You may need to inform and educate teachers and sport coaches to help foster participation. Use real-life activities as a means to achieve your goals
  • Evaluate outcomes: You may or may not have the opportunity to use standardized tools to evaluate outcomes. Whether or not you do, you can still encourage children and families to share their level of satisfaction and report on perceived changes with regard to their initial concerns
If you are based in a rehabilitation centre:
  • Plan collaboratively: An interdisciplinary intervention plan is needed that involves children and families, a rehabilitation team, community partners, and educators. Whether formal or informal, ensure that responsibilities will be shared to respond to the children’s and families' concerns.
  • Foster participation: Introduce real-life activities in context. Use global strategies such as education to adults in the children's environment, and move to more specialized and individualized interventions only as needed (see Other Intervention Principles section).
  • Evaluate outcomes: If possible, encourage one rehabilitation team member to use standardized tools to document changes.
If you are based in a school setting:
  • Plan collaboratively: As children are usually referred by their teachers, it is important to identify their concerns. Help teachers to understand DCD and the need to adapt their expectations. Ask children about other issues at home or in the community. Meet or communicate with their parents. If needed, discuss issues at a school meeting and work together to identify solutions.
  • Foster participation: Identify concrete solutions to increase children's participation in school activities (e.g., adapt ball games in physical education, modify tasks at recess - see M.A.T.C.H. strategies). Provide recommendations to families to ensure children's participation at home and in the community.
  • Evaluate outcomes: Follow-up with children and teachers to determine whether problems have been resolved.
So what about Max?
If you have the opportunity to go to school, Max’s teacher may want you to work individually with Max during your therapist visits. Instead, you could collaborate with the teacher, discussing innovative ways in which you can work directly in the classroom with both the teacher and Max to identify and trial solutions to classroom concerns.