Helen Parsons, MSc, OT: OT and Tai Chi

In this episode, we will learn from Helen Parsons, MSc OT, an Occupational Therapist who specializes in Tai Chi. Helen is a HCPC registered Occupational Therapist, holds a MSc Occupational Therapy and BSc Sport, Health, Exercise and Nutrition. She is passionate about evidence-based practice for supporting people with their health and wellness. Helen has practiced and studied Tai Chi and Qigong for over ten years. She is a Board Certified Instructor with the Tai Chi for Health Institute and works with Phil, her partner, coaching older adults as a British Powerlifting Level 1 Coach, Kettlebell instructor, and is a qualified in Boxercise for Parkinsons Instructor. When she's not working Helen loves getting outdoors, enjoys Brazilian Jiu-jitsu, kickboxing, and pottering in the garden. 

Q & A with Helen:

Please tell us a little about yourself and a few favorite occupations.

I am UK based self employed OT living in West Yorkshire, UK. I started doing tai chi with my partner about 15 years ago. He had been doing tai chi and qigong for many years already and started teaching me. I now teach tai chi in my local community and online and also deliver an online course for OT and other rehabilitation professionals called 'Tai Chi for Therapists'. I do this with my partner, who is now my business partner! I think being physically active and doing meaningful physical activity is key for health and well-being. As you might expect my favourite occupations are physical activities, weight training, Brazillian Ju Jitsu and easy walks with my partner.

What motivated you to contribute to this podcast series?

I think occupational therapy has such a wide range of possibilities within it and it's great to be able to share this with other people who are already OTs or wanting to become OT.

Please describe the UncommonOT work that you do and the setting in which you work, the population you serve and the needs that you address.

My work involves teaching tai chi in local community classes. Our classes are in the daytime and our participants are mainly retired older people. Tai Chi is recommended in UK physical activity guidelines for balance, and also in the World Falls Prevention Guidelines, for community dwelling older people. Many older people are living with at least one long term condition such as OA and while they know they should be physically many people find it difficult to take part. The world of tai chi and qigong is less regulated than people imagine and so while it is regularly promoted as being good for health and well-being and suitable for older people in the wider media there is no guarantee that the instructor is interested in teaching these aspects or teaching them in a way that is suitable for older people.

What inspired you or drew you to this type of OT work?

We started one class and then got asked to do another and it slowly grew and grew. We could see that many older people wanted to do it, that it became a meaningful physical activity for lots of people living long term conditions. We started to realise how inaccessible many activities are, even going for a walk or going swimming are difficult for many people and yet they are often recommended by Doctors. We focused our teaching on people with long term conditions and I was interested in what research there was and I found there was a huge amount. This became a virtuous circle the more I found out the more we wanted to share tai chi with people both rehab professionals and people living with health conditions.

How did you get there? Can you describe your path?

We started with one evening class and no one attended. We tried a different venue and then the class started to grow. And we just kept opening classes and filling them. Our local community rehab team got in touch and asked to come and talk to them as they kept hearing about us from their patients. We went a did a day training and we got great feedback and we knew we wanted to do more of that but were too busy running our classes. Then March 2020 arrived and we shut all our classes. We learnt how to deliver online sessions which was a huge learning curve. But once over that hurdle we had time to build on online course for rehab professionals. It again was a bit of trial and error but now we are now delivering our course online 5 times a year. We have a mixture of OT, physios and assistants attending the course.

Please describe a typical day or OT session at your uncommon setting? What OT skills do you utilize?

I will usually be delivering a class in the morning, either face to face or online and then afternoon is admin tasks and updating the course materials. OT skills - understanding different health conditions and how to adapt tai chi for a range of people. Looking at recently published research and adding to our course materials on the Tai Chi for Therapists course.

Can you talk about some recent highs (successes) and lows (challenges) of your current role?

We have really enjoyed starting our own podcast and speaking with past course participants to find out how they had been using what they had learnt on our course. And it was quite moving to hear the impact tai chi had in different clinical settings and how much OTs have enjoyed using this skill in different ways. Self employment is always a challenge as nothing a guaranteed so it always an adventure.

How do you continue to learn in order to stay on top of things within your role?

Learning how to use LLM AI is a great big help. I think it will become more and more useful.

Can you share a little bit about salary and compensation in this setting?  How do OT or the services you provide get funded?

Self employed so more in control of the hours I work which is more important to me than income, once all the bills have been paid obviously!

Any career advice for our followers and listeners on how to get started on this path?

Try to grade your approach as you would do for tasks for other people, don't expect to learn tai chi in a couple of weeks and or expect to be a tai chi teacher taking large classes in a couple of weeks. Make sure you like doing tai chi, try it out either video or community classes. Don't give up too early, don't try and take on too much at first. Practice of simple movement regularly is very beneficial. Once you feel comfortable and relaxed doing a few movements yourself, try sharing them with colleagues or friends or family. Get feedback from them and gradually build up from there.

What’s a common myth or misconception about your job/role you’d like to call out or demystify?

I'm not sure what myths there are about my job but there are definitely a lot of myths within tai chi and qigong. Myths are part of its cultural history and as such we should do our best to understand this rich heritage. To this we can bring our clinical reasoning, OT focused lens and person centred practise, to see if and how we might introduce it in our setting.

How do we find you, follow you, be in touch with you, and promote your unique work?

Our website is www.TaiChiforTherapists.com

Our podcast 'Tai chi for Therapists' can be found on all the usual podcast players.

Please list any resources you would like me to include with your Show Notes (courses, articles, assessments, tools, etc.)

Podcast https://www.taichifortherapists.com/podcast OT specific reference list: https://www.mybib.com/j/MurkyFragileQuetzal

As always, I welcome any feedback & ideas from all of you, or if you are interested in being a guest on future episodes, please do not hesitate to contact Patricia Motus at transitionsot@gmail.com or DM via Instagram @transitionsot

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