[humanser] Non-visual observational skills in therapy.

[Kaiti Shelton]

Hi all,

As some of you know, I am an undergraduate student working towards a
degree in Music Therapy.  Last semester I had some issues in my first
practicum sequence course.  I was unable to adequately complete
clinical documentation because I simply did not have the level of
information the supervising professor wanted to see on the form.  I
know it was substantially less than I needed to have, and she has told
me the information I gathered would have not been enough to
effectively carry out treatment.

I am working with her and two other music therapy professors of mine
to solve this problem, because although my musicality and
therapist/client interaction were great, I have to repeat the class so
I can get better at observing, gathering data, and completing
documentation.  Much of the problem seems to stem from a lack of
understanding of what I can and cannot see from my professors.  I had
a meeting with them this past week in which I actually demonstrated
what I could see my professor doing from 4 feet away, so that they
would get an idea of what I realistically can tell using sight.  That
seems to have helped.

One of the problems last semester was that my group was quite large.
My partner and I had between 10-20 people in each session, but as both
of us were responsible for completing our own documentation, this
proved to be a challenge for me.  The first accommodation we came up
with, at least for the time being, is that I will be able to focus on
3-4 clients per session and focus on providing quality information on
them.  This way I will have a lower quantity of clients to
specifically target, but can get the information and the depth of what
my professors are looking for.  I will also do other things like use a
rolling stool like what doctors use to keep myself on eye level with
the clients, and I will have documentation time immediately following
the session.  To help me document things I didn't see, my team will
meet for 15-20 minutes to do basic documentation together and discuss
what we individually noticed.  This way, although I won't see visual
elements of the session, I can document that someone else did.

I am also setting up a conference between my professors, myself, and a
music therapist I know who is blind.  My hope is that by bringing us
together on a call, the professors who know the standards I need to
reach, the student who knows the challenges I have in practicum, and a
professional who knows practically how to mediate the two, we can find
more solutions.

I am curious to get as much input on this topic as I can though, so
I'm wondering how some of you in other fields use nonvisual techniques
to observe for documentation.  If you haveparticular experience doing
this for things like range of motion improvement, that would be great.

-- 
Kaiti