Occupational therapy has its roots firmly placed in the history of rehabilitative and psychiatric medicine. Recognition of the usefulness of activity for therapy and the importance of environment began to emerge in the 18th and 19th centuries during the "Age of Enlightenment" and "Moral Treatment" movements when the conditions of hospitals and asylums were questioned by people such as Phillipe Pinel, William Tuke, and later, Dorothea Dix. But it was not until the early 1900s, both in Canada and the United States, that the profession of occupational therapy was realized and educational programmes were developed.
The most notable time in history to mark the beginnings of occupational therapy was during World War I when therapists were known as "reconstructive" or "ward" aides.1 By 1926, the Canadian Association of Occupational Therapists was formed with much of its activity concentrated in central Canada.1 After completing short stints of training in Toronto or Montreal, a number of individual therapists returned to the east coast to work with injured soldiers returning from war. But it would be several years before the first provincially organized groups of therapists would emerge in Atlantic Canada. Click here to see a timeline of key events that shaped occupational therapy in today's Atlantic provinces.
Please use the menu on the left to explore the evolution of occupational therapy in each of the Atlantic provinces.
1. Friedland, J. Robinson, I. and Cardwell, T. (2001). In the beginning: CAOT from 1926-1939. Occupational Therapy Now, 3(1). Retrieved January 18, 2006 from www.caot.ca/otnow/jan01-eng/jan01.cfm.