Assalamu Alaikum,
I am Mansura Akter Mow, a 4th-year student of BSc in Occupational Therapy at the Bangladesh Health Professions Institute (BHPI), CRP.
In my course curriculum, Advanced Placement is one of the components, and I have completed it at faith Bangladesh over the past month. During this time, I have learned a lot from faith Bangladesh.
First of all, I would like to mention the process I went through to get permission here. I contacted Lead Occupational Therapist Humaira Ma’am, and then conducted the permission procedure. I collected the permission letter from my department, and we created a profile that included a QR code. Using that code, we could enter faith and access the premises.
This was something different for me, as I had never experienced such a process when entering any other office before. The technological approach here impressed me from the very beginning. Even in the future, if I work somewhere else, I will share this experience with my friends as something I found very positive.
We started our placement on the 1st of the month. On the first day, we had an orientation program where we were given an overview of Faith Bangladesh. This included information about the cafeteria, training, therapy services, and the Brighter Life School located here. We learned about the activities performed at the school, as well as the types of work carried out in the playground. This gave me a clear idea of the kinds of services and activities faith provides.
In the first week, I mostly did observations alongside my supervisor. I observed different types of patients and, by speaking with their parents, collected their case histories. I tried to link these histories with my theoretical learning to better understand the possible issues and problems patients might face, as well as the techniques my supervisor used for therapy and counseling.
One thing that really stood out to me was the diary maintenance system. Both Speech & Language Therapists and Occupational Therapists maintained the same diary, which I found very effective and interesting.
Alongside observations, we gradually increased our involvement with the patients. From the third week, we started planning and working with the children ourselves. I realized that while the therapists made the work seem easy, in practice, it was not so simple when I tried it myself.
We also had the opportunity to work with a patient in the Dependent Learning Unit at Brighter Life School. This experience gave me a clear idea of how to handle a patient completely and how to implement the role of occupational therapy within a school setting.
In addition, Speech & Language Therapists and Occupational Therapists here conduct group sessions—such as low-functioning groups and moderate-functioning groups. We participated in their planning and learned how to engage children in group therapy, overcome challenges, and promote attention, interaction, and social play.
We attended a session on the Code of Conduct, which gave us valuable knowledge about the ethics, principles, rules, regulations, and behavioral expectations at Faith Bangladesh. These lessons will be very useful in our future careers. Our respected occupational therapists also arranged case presentations on different conditions, helping us relate our theoretical learning with the observations we had made so far.
I personally presented a case study on a child I had worked with at the school. In my presentation, I described the treatment plans, goal setting, challenges, and parental recommendations for the child.
Finally, we gave a full presentation on our Advanced Placement experience at Faith Bangladesh. At the end, we submitted a project based on a Cognitive Board—demonstrating how it could be used for various purposes, such as assessing a child’s cognitive abilities, improving problem-solving skills, and enhancing memory.
Thanks to the cooperation of everyone here, my one-month Advanced Placement journey was smooth and enjoyable.
I would like to express my sincere thanks to all the staff.
Thank you to all the staff, and thank you faith Bangladesh.
