11 Possible Topic for Doc2 Assignment

Okay.  Let's just skip the fancy rhetoric and get to the nitty gritty.  Long story short:  Hamon assigned us Doc2 and he wanted us to find a controversy on my chosen field.  Blah, blah, blah.  Couldn't think of such a debate, did research and now I have something.  You get the gist of these introductions.

(Sheesh.  Glad that's out of the way.)

While this topic is not set in stone, I was thinking of writing of the "Sensory Processing" Debate found in the world of Occupational Therapy (and its assistants).  Basically, the controversy revolves around the treatment of children with a variety of attention, learning, motor skill, social and emotional disorders grouped under a heading called "Sensory Processing Disorder"; which seems to be related to such childhood disorders as ADHD and Autism amongst others.  Occupational Therapists (and OT Assistants, by proxy) respond to patients with SPD by prescribing various activities for afflicted children within a "Stress Gym" aimed to provide the physical and cognitive support that alleviates symptoms and results are fairly positive with said treatment.

The problem is that health professionals outside of OT have several problems with the SPD idea.  The first being that SPD is not a listed disorder within medical archives; which has prompted many doctors to reject OT ideas on the issue.  Other problems arise within the medical community dismissing "Stress Gym" treatment as unscientific as compared to treatment via medication, as well as the effectiveness, leading researchers seeing the Stress Gym (filled with fabric swings and other equipment seen as fun for youngsters) as an ineffective treatment; that the Stress Gym is but a reward to unruly, childlike behavior.

My own stance on the SPD Debate is that is does not matter whether SPD is a literal disorder or a collection of disorders or exists at all.  The point is that learning, motor and emotional disorders are a very real thing in the lives of many children, and, while the Stress Gym is not a perfect intervention, I find the idea and possible future methods of treatment that are outside the domain of medicating children into submission to be wholly worthwhile of pursuit.  That cooperation between OT and other divisions of health care would benefit from working together to resolve these children's traumas instead of bickering over terminology that doesn't matter.

But that is only a potentiality and not a set topic yet.

Blessed Be.