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| TTOTA
Launch Day |
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On
Thursday 16th December, 2004 the official launch of the Trinidad
& Tobago Occupational Therapy Association (TTOTA) took place
at the Immortelle Children’s Centre for Special Education
in At. Anns, Trinidad, before an invited audience from the Ministry
of Health, Ministry of Social Development, Social Services Unit,
Regional Health Authorities, NGO’s, colleagues and friends.
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Lesley Garcia (TTOTA president) and
Daniel |
Left
to Right: Neela Ojar, Lesley Garcia and Rosemary Green |
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The principal
of the school, Jaqui Leotaud welcomed our guests and Rosemary Green
representing Tobago made an opening statement. Our founding president,
Lesley Anne Garcia gave a feature address explaining the philosophical
base of the profession, its scope of practice and congruence with
modern health care models.
She
spoke of our vision for the future of the profession in Trinidad
& Tobago and welcomed the Governments support in strengthening
the Council for Professions Related to Medicine over the past years. |
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She emphasised
the purpose of the launch was to introduce the Association and to
form alliances with all stakeholders in order to create meaningful
and sustainable transformations in the delivery of Occupational
Therapy services nationally.
At the reception our numbers were increased by (3)
students from Canada and (1) from the United States of America together
with (2) Occupational Therapists from the UK who are in Trinidad
doing voluntary work. Neela Ojar, our founding Secretary, spoke
on what Occupational Therapy is and three of the students gave illustrative
presentations on our work in Schools, with Physical Disabilities,
Geriatrics and in Mental Health. It was a very successful evening
with ample food and drink, in true “Trini “ fashion,
and was well covered by the press.
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| Above:
The TTOTA team 2004/05 |
Nicola McGarvey reads the letter from Ann Wilcock. |
Occupational
Therapy was the single feature in the Talk of Trinidad section of
the Guardian newspaper the following day. For the Occupational Therapists
present the high point of the evening occurred when Nicola Mc Garvey
read out a letter of congratulations and encouragement which we
had received from Ann Wilcock. Borrowing from Ms. Wilcock, the theme
and spirit of the launch was “Doing, Being and Becoming”.
(Ms. Wilcock’s greeting -link) gave us great encouragement
and re-enforced our determination to persuade the Regional Health
Authorities to re-fund the posts which have been vacant for many
years, and of course to create new ones in the various Specialised
Units, such as, Burns, Hand Therapy and Oncology. |
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