Training is expensive. Health and Social care budgets are being slashed and usually this means that training and learning opportunities are some of the first casualties. There are however numerous resources that can be used to source free Occupational Therapy learning that can be made relevant for your Continuing Professional Development portfolio required by the HCPC. It just takes a little imagination and creativity.
MOOCs : Massive Open Online Courses – Free Occupational Therapy Training
- Open University
: Huge list of online courses with a specialist section dedicated to Health Sports
and Psychology subjects. For example courses on the Science Behind Wheelchair Sports, Improving healthcare, Concepts of Ageing as the tip of the iceberg. - Open Learn : Again hundreds of courses and with a specialist section for Health and Psychology. Offering topics such as Working with Disability, Clinical supervision with confidence, Ageing Well – Falls
- Openlearning : Smaller site with less options but does have some very valuable tools such as Diploma in Health and Social Care management.
- iVersity : More commercially and business focused but with some imagination you can take concepts such as Social Entrepreneurship and apply them to your own practice.
- Open2Study : Probably the smallest of all but with some specific health modules such as the Body as a Machine probably worth a look. Wider topics may be useful as you start to develop your career for examples one session covers How To Become A Confident Trainer.
- Stamford on line : Courses available from Stamford university For example at the moment they are offering the course – Statistics for Medical Professionals. Always a useful primer if you are wanting to feel more confident in analysing and evaluating audit and clinical outcome data for your service. Alternatively understanding basic statistical methodology will certainly help you get to grips with the numbers when considering the papers that sit behind our evidence base.
Leadership and management Learning resources:
- Academi Wales : is an on-line free leadership training resource focused on developing current and future leaders throughout the public services in Wales. Many of the resources are available to download directly without registering. For example the development videos in the showcase section are readily available.
- Business Balls : despite the 80’s posturing implied in the title, Business Balls is a great launch pad for all things to do with self development. When you start to thing about moving into roles that have elements of leadership or management involved you may be surprised to find that there is no right way to do it. The greatest resource you have is YOU. The more you can understand how you work, think and feel as a conscious influence on the decisions you make the better leader you will be. Business Balls is a management 101 for this type of development.
- LeAD : NHS England leadership for clinicians resources. LeAD is an e-learning resource to support clinicians, of all professions, to develop an understanding of their role in contributing to the management and leadership of health care services.
- Open University Free Leadership Courses : The OU resources are so numerous that even though I mentioned them in the general section it is worth specifically highlighting the Leadership and management resources they have available and all for free! I would be amazed if there was not something there to start you off on your learning journey. Topics include – Making Decisions, Managing and Managing People, How Teams Work, or The importance of Interpersonal Skills.
There are literally hundreds of hours of resources and tools available that you can covert into free Occupational Therapy learning. Just remember even if your service has no budget for training there are many other ways they can support your development, for example by providing study time, mentoring, shadowing opportunities journal clubs or opportunities to put into practice what you learn from your studies. Try and be creative, and go learn something.
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