AOTA 2021 Standards for Continuing Competence in Occupational Therapy
American Occupational Therapy Association
Abstract
Continuing competence is essential to occupational therapists and occupational therapy assistants for fulfilling their roles and abilities across experience, context, and time. It requires an ongoing process to keep up with new developments related to the profession and specialty areas throughout one's career (i.e., early, mid-, late, change, or reentry). To build capacity, occupational therapists and occupational therapy assistants must commit to a process of self-assessment, reflecting on, in, and toward action to advance the knowledge, professional reasoning, interpersonal skills, performance skills, and ethical practice necessary to perform current and future roles and responsibilities within the profession. The American Occupational Therapy Association's Standards for Continuing Competence serve as a foundation for analyzing the occupation in regard to continuing competence. These standards can be viewed separately and collectively and can be combined with other standards documents to gain an overarching perspective.