Centre for Policy on Ageing



Are occupational therapists more effective than social workers when assessing frail older people? — results of CAMELOT, a randomised controlled trial
Author(s)	Sandra Stewart, Ian Harvey, Fiona Poland
Journal title	Age and Ageing, vol 34, no 1, January 2005
Pages	pp 41-46
Source	http://www.ageing.oupjournals.org
Keywords	Social workers ; Occupational therapists ; Evaluation ; Performance ; Comparison ; Cambridgeshire.
Annotation	Participants were 321 older people living in their own homes and 113 carers in Cambridgeshire, who were randomised into two groups, to receive either occupational therapist-led or social worker-led assessment. 264 (82%) completed the study. No major outcome differences were found in functional independence and quality of life between older people assessed by social workers or occupational therapists. At the final 8-month follow-up, carers of clients to the social work arm of the trial had better outcomes in relation to the number of and difficulty of caring tasks being undertaken, while the occupational therapy arm of the trial had a superior quality of life score. However, delays in making occupational therapy assessments and in completing recommended housing adaptations may have contributed to the study's negative findings. (RH).
Accession Number	CPA-050127209 A
Classmark	QR: QTR: 4C: 5H: 48: 8C
Data © Centre for Policy on Ageing

...from the Ageinfo database published by Centre for Policy on Ageing.