Staying well when social distancing

1. Establish a daily routine. Routines provide reassuring structure and purpose for children and families. Include a mix of learning, creative, physical and relaxation time and schedule time for ‘electronics’ if this is important for your child. Help your child make a visual timetable so everyone understands the plan. 
2. Make time for physical activity. Encourage your child outside if you can and rediscover garden games such as swing ball, skipping and tennis. If you can’t get outside suggest your child makes an indoor obstacle course or follows an online exercise programme. The BBC and ITV are adding fitness programmes to their broadcast schedules. There are also a multitude of free videos and fitness instructions online provided you have internet access.
3. Work on personal care skills. Identify self-care tasks that your child would like to do more independently, for example tying shoelaces or getting dressed. Look online for ideas about how to break the task down into manageable parts or for different approaches to make the task easier.
4. Develop life skills. Now is a great time for your child to master useful life skills such as preparing their lunch, using a washing machine and changing the sheets on a bed. Involve other family members in teaching skills (perhaps via video link) or use online tutorials which ensure that instructions are given consistently. Older children could complete online courses in first aid or start to learn another language.
5. Create a suitable place for your child to study which is different to their relaxation space. Ideally your child should have an appropriately sized chair and table, but if they must use adult furniture make sure they can sit so that their feet can be firmly planted and their shoulders relaxed when working at the table. 
6. Teach your child to type. Typing is a valuable skill for education, social communication and for the workplace. There are a variety of free and paid-for online typing tutorials available – choose the one that works best for your child. 
7. Rediscover creative activities such as playdough, junk modelling, Lego and origami. 
8. Spend social time together as a family. Play board games, watch a film, make a cake, play multiplayer console games together. Schedule mealtimes and commit to these as adults, especially if you are working from home. They are a useful time to connect socially as a family.
9. Keep in touch. Arrange for your child to spend time each day talking to friends or family members on the phone or by social media (with adult supervision where appropriate). Write letters to older family members and maybe your child will receive one in return. 
10. Look after yourself. Being a full-time parent/carer whilst managing a household and handling work responsibilities is challenging. Make sure you eat and sleep well, and include time for your own rest and leisure in your daily routine. 

1. Establish a daily routine. Routines provide structure and purpose.
2. Balance your weekly routine so you have a good mix of work (activities that have to be done), rest and leisure.
3. Think about the regular activities that are most important to you. What are the important elements to these? Can you adapt them to carry out in the home? For example, instead of a class, following an online strength and balance routine.   
4. Set daily goals to provide purpose and a sense of achievement. This might include working through that list of the things you keep meaning to do but never get round to?
5. Identify the triggers that make you feel low and look for ways to reduce or manage them.
6. Talk with family, friends and neighbours to help them understand how you feel and how they can help. Can they talk you through using apps on your mobile phone, for instance?
7. Take care of yourself. Eat and drink healthily with plenty of fruit, vegetables and water to support your immune function and energy levels. For more information see the BDA website.
8. Avoid staying still for too long. Exercise and regular movement will maintain fitness and strength. If you are working from home, take breaks and eat away from your “desk.”
9. Have a good sleep routine. If you are struggling, try avoiding tea and coffee in the late afternoon and evening, take a bath, using blackout curtains, listening to gentle music or deep breathing exercises.
10. Keep in touch. Arrange to speak to someone most days on the phone, through social media or over the garden fence. Age UK and Silverline have people to speak to.

Everyone’s lives and daily routines have been affected by social distancing and the COVID-19 pandemic. More than ever we need to be looking after ourselves and for many, this includes managing health conditions.

Here are some tips to help you to manage your health conditions during social distancing or self-isolation. There may also be other things you can do to help manage specific conditions so do ask for advice from your occupational therapist and other healthcare professionals.

1) Use digital resources. The NHS App Library has lots of online tools for managing a range of physical and mental health conditions, most of which are free to use. Many health charities have self-management information on their websites suitable for specific health conditions.

Make sure that you only take advice from trustworthy sources. If your health needs change, or you become unwell, please contact your GP or get NHS advice:

• England: NHS advice online or call 111
• Northern Ireland: GP Out of Hours or call 999 if emergency or life threatening, 111 calls are for coronavirus only
• Wales: NHS Direct Wales online or call 111 or 0845 46 47 (depending on geographic locations)
• Scotland: NHS advice online or call 111

2) Set goals. Goals give us a sense of purpose and mark our progress. They are something to aim for, and can help motivate us.  

As you work towards your goal, listen to your body and how you are feeling. Be prepared to be flexible; you may need to adapt your goals and that’s okay. If you find that you’re putting too much pressure on yourself, try using cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) strategies. You can find out more about CBT in the NHS App Library or by speaking to a healthcare professional for local services.

Consider keeping a diary of what you have been able to do and your achievements – this can be a great reminder of your progress, especially on not so good days.

3) Pace your routine. If you experience fatigue, breathlessness or chronic pain, it can help to spread your activities throughout the day or week, rather than trying to complete everything in one go.

Start by making a list of the tasks and activities you both need and would like to do. Make sure you include activities you enjoy; these shouldn’t be sacrificed for activities that you need to do. Having a balance is very important.

Then break your tasks and activities into small steps, plan when you can do them and give yourself plenty of time. Pace yourself and take regular breaks. Remember, you can be flexible with what you do and when.

4) Problem Solve. Look at your daily routine and see where you may have problems. Consider each task separately and see if there is anything that you could stop doing, or do differently to make it easier. Identify any triggers that make you feel worse and look for ways to reduce or manage them.

5) Take care of yourself. Eat and drink healthily with plenty of fruit, vegetables and water. Even if you are not hungry, have a little - it will help boost your immune system and energy levels.

6) Get enough sleep. Sleep is important in managing lots of health symptoms. If you’re struggling to sleep, there are simple steps you can try to improve this. Such as, cutting out alcohol and caffeine, going to bed at a regular time, using blackout curtains and practising relaxation techniques. Find more tips and advice on the NHS Every Mind Matters website.

7) Take time to relax. Relaxation can help with managing symptoms like fatigue, breathlessness and chronic pain. The NHS App Library has a number of relaxation tools, including breathing and mindfulness.

Allow yourself time to participate in relaxing activities that you enjoy, such as reading, listening to music, arts and crafts, and puzzles.

8) Keep moving. Exercise is good for managing a wide range of physical and mental health conditions, but it is important to pace yourself and stick to activities that are suitable for your particular condition. The NHS Fitness Studio has a range of videos that can be followed at home.

Keeping mobile is good for your muscles and joints. Set yourself a timer to remind you to move every 20 minutes.

9) Manage your home. Organise your home so the items you use most are within easy reach and to reduce the demands on your body. Make your home safer by decluttering and removing loose rugs and items which may cause you to trip or fall.

Make adaptations that reduce effort and risk. This could be rearranging furniture, changing the height of your chair or bed, or installing bathing aids. The Disabled Living Foundation provides lots of useful information about equipment and adaptations.

10) Seek support. This is a challenging time for everyone, so ask for help if you need it. Talk to friends and family members and let them know how they can help you. This might include asking them to let you do things for yourself, as keeping active is very important for managing lots of health conditions.

Many health charities offer support for specific health conditions by telephone and through online groups and resources. Look on their websites for more information – remember to only take advice from trustworthy sources.

Organisations like Samaritans and The Silver Line also offer telephone help and advice for people who are having difficulty in any area of their life.

If you need advice for your specific health condition, or your health needs change, please speak to your occupational therapist, GP or other healthcare professional.

1. Use the Career Development Framework to identify your current level of knowledge and skills. You will also find templates including a 12-month plan, identifying CPD with teams and so much more.
    
2. Look for inspiration in the Learning resources across the pillars tab where you can select resources to support your learning in Practice, Teaching, Leadership and Research.
    
3. Download one of the CPD Short Courses. Each one has a workbook and a presentation, plus space to capture your reflections. You can do them on your own. Or arrange an online meet up with a virtual group of people to share and discuss.
    
4. Consider hosting online a virtual debate session or a brown bag lunch. The Toolkit for Self-Directed Learning will guide you through how to do these.
    
5. Think about your CPD portfolio – watch our films and read resources via the Support with HCPC audit tab.
    
6. Listen to one of our podcasts.
    
7. Search CINAHL and Medline remotely at the RCOT library to access a wide range of article (tick the box that says ‘Linked full text’ to refine your search).

The activities undertaken and challenges faced by occupational therapists during the COVID-19 pandemic are undoubtedly highly stressful.  No matter what setting you are working in, you will be dealing with and trying to manage significant disruption to your work and home life.  This also presents us with fast paced learning opportunities from situations managed, conversations in corridors, our responses to latest developments and more. 

This simple template adapts the ‘What? So what? Now what?’ model of reflection (Rolfe et al, 2001) to give you the opportunity to take just five minutes to capture learning for your portfolio and to consider what support you might need.  These reflections can be referred back to in supervision now and in the future as part of capturing our learning from this global pandemic.

The template can be filled in digitally or by hand, and can be downloaded below.