Perth mum creates digital platform to combat long waitlists for children's occupational therapy

West Australian children are waiting an average of nine months for occupational therapy in the public health system. Now, Perth mum-of-five and occupational therapist Stephanie Clarke is trying to combat the long waits by launching a digital platform to deliver immediate access to personalised therapy. The platform, OT-Me., works by creating yearly developmental skill targets that are personalised to a child, giving monthly goals to work towards and daily activities to complete at home or school. Ms Clarke said the tool was inspired by her own experience of providing early intervention to her son, but also realising his peers with developmental delays did not have the same access to care. Alexei Clarke-Jennings, now 10, was 18 months old when he suffered a prolonged seizure, which caused his airways and veins to collapse. The situation became so dire that his shin bone had to be drilled into to get lines in and the only way to stop the seizure was to put him in an induced coma. “They saved his life but, as his mum and also as an OT, I started to notice neurologically that something wasn’t right. He wasn’t hitting those milestones,” Ms Clarke said. “I guess the ‘mum hat’ came off and ‘OT hat’ came on, and I put an early intervention plan in place for him. We ended up having to wait two years for speech therapy but as an OT I was able to help him straight away. “He just turned 10 and he’s absolutely thriving now. Without occupational therapy, he wouldn’t be where he is.” Other children haven’t been as fortunate, with families in WA waiting just over nine months on average for a Child and Adolescent Health Service occupational therapy appointment (as of the end of March). The median wait time for primary school children — aged between 3.5 years to 12.5 years — to access an occupational therapist is 9.6 months. A CAHS spokesman said the Child Development Service endeavoured to provide families with wait-time information and, where relevant, information and support to families to access other services and community resources. “Referrals received for the child development services have increased over the last 10 years, in line with global trends. This increased demand has unfortunately led to increased wait times for services,” he said. “When a referral is received for a CDS service, it is triaged and prioritised based on each child’s clinical need. “CAHS is addressing growing demand for services by increasing clinical staff, including OTs, and implementing a raft of reforms to improve access and support.” Ms Clarke said the number of children waiting for support was “still rising, because there’s just not enough supply for the demand”. She said she hoped OT-Me. could bridge this wait list gap. “I’ve tried to replicate what I do, and it’s not going to replace OT, but what it will do is hopefully fill that wait-list gap,” Ms Clarke said. Ms Clarke is now planning to launch a teen version, which IDEA Academy — a school for neurodiverse students — will be trialling through a pilot program. West Byford Primary School will also be trialling the platform to see how well it can work within the school system. OT-Me. is eligible for people to access through the National Disability Insurance Scheme if it’s recommended for core support or capacity building. It is hoped the programs will eventually be eligible for people to access through all avenues of the NDIS.