Neb. Rev. Stat. § 38-2510 — NE Code / Chapter 38 / Section 38-2510
View Statute 38-2510
Status: in_force

(1) Practice of occupational therapy means the therapeutic use of everyday life occupations with persons, groups, or populations to support occupational performance and participation. Occupational therapy practice includes clinical reasoning and professional judgment to evaluate, analyze, and diagnose occupational challenges and provide occupation-based interventions. Occupational therapy services include habilitation, rehabilitation, and the promotion of physical and mental health and wellness for clients with all levels of ability-related needs. These services are provided to a client who has, or is at risk for, developing an illness, injury, disease, disorder, condition, impairment, disability, activity limitation, or participation restriction. Through the provision of skilled services and engagement in everyday activities, occupational therapy promotes physical and mental health and well-being by supporting occupational performance in a person with, or at risk of experiencing, a range of developmental, physical, and mental health disorders.

(2) The practice of occupational therapy includes the following components:

(a) Evaluation of factors affecting activities of daily living, instrumental activities of daily living, health management, rest and sleep, education, work, play, leisure, and social participation, and includes environmental and personal factors and occupational and activity demands that affect performance;

(b) Performance patterns, including habits, routines, roles, and rituals;

(c) Performance skills, including motor skills, process skills, and social interaction skills;

(d) Client factors, including body functions and structures, values, and spirituality;

(e) Methods or approaches to identify and select intervention, including (i) establishment, remediation, or restoration of a skill or ability that has not yet developed, is impaired, or is in decline, (ii) compensation, modification, or adaptation of occupations, activities, and contexts to improve or enhance performance, (iii) maintenance of capabilities to prevent decline in performance of everyday life occupations, (iv) health promotion and wellness to enable or enhance performance of everyday life activities and quality of life, and (v) prevention of occurrence or emergence of barriers to performance and participation, including injury and disability prevention; and

(f) Interventions and procedures to promote or enhance safety and performance in activities of daily living, independent activities of daily living, health management, rest and sleep, education, work, play, leisure, and social participation, and includes:

(i) Therapeutic use of occupations and activities;

(ii) Training in self-care, self-management, health management, home management, community and work integration, school activities, and work performance;

(iii) Identification, development, remediation, or compensation of physical, neuromusculoskeletal, sensory-perceptual, emotional regulation, visual, and mental and cognitive functions, pain tolerance and management, praxis, developmental skills, and behavioral skills;

(iv) Education and training of persons, including family members, caregivers, groups, and populations;

(v) Care coordination, case management, and transition services;

(vi) Consultation services to persons, groups, populations, programs, organizations, and communities;

(vii) Virtual interventions;

(viii) Modification of contexts and adaptation of processes, including the application of ergonomic principles;

(ix) Assessment, design, fabrication, application, fitting, and training in seating and positioning, assistive technology, adaptive devices, and orthotic devices, and training in the use of prosthetic devices;

(x) Assessment, recommendation, and training in techniques to enhance functional mobility, including fitting and management of wheelchairs and other mobility devices;

(xi) Exercises, including tasks and methods to increase motion, strength, and endurance for occupational participation;

(xii) Remediation of, and compensation for, visual deficits, including low vision rehabilitation;

(xiii) Driver rehabilitation and community mobility;

(xiv) Management of feeding, eating, and swallowing to enable eating and feeding performance;

(xv) Application of physical agent, instrument-assisted, and mechanical modalities and the use of a range of specific therapeutic procedures and techniques to enhance sensory, motor, perceptual, and cognitive processing, and manual therapy techniques to enhance performance skills;

(xvi) Facilitating the occupational participation of persons, groups, or populations through modification of contexts and adaptation of processes;

(xvii) Efforts directed toward promoting occupational justice and empowering clients to seek and obtain resources to fully participate in everyday life occupations;

(xviii) Group interventions; and

(xix) Addressing wound care.

(3) Occupational therapy does not include the use of joint manipulation, grade five mobilization or manipulation, thrust joint manipulation, high-velocity or low-amplitude thrust, or any other procedure intended to result in joint cavitation. Joint manipulation commences where grades one through four mobilization ends.

Laws 2007, LB463, § 850;

Laws 2025, LB257, § 7.