Learning Health Systems Can Promote and Sustain High-Value Occupational Therapy

Abstract

In the current policy context, the occupational therapy profession must act to promote and sustain high-value care. Stakeholders have delineated efforts, such as defining and measuring high-quality care processes or promoting the adoption of evidence into practice, that can enhance the value of occupational therapy services. There is a growing recognition, however, that low-value care is the product of deficiencies within health care systems and is therefore most amenable to system-level solutions. To date, the specific nature of system-level changes capable of identifying and rectifying low-value occupational therapy has yet to be elucidated. In this "The Issue Is. . ." column, we introduce occupational therapy to the Learning Health System concept and its essential functions. Moreover, we discuss action steps for occupational therapy stakeholders to lay the foundation for Learning Health Systems in their own professional contexts. What This Article Adds: This article is the first to outline concrete action steps needed to transform occupational therapy practice contexts into Learning Health Systems. Such a transformation would represent a system-level change capable of fostering the delivery of high-value occupational therapy services to clients in a variety of practice settings.