Is there need for more Occupational Therapists in NZ?

With Top Quality Universities & Institutes, New Zealand possess a globally recognised education system. With the ageing population of the country, role of occupational therapits is becoming increasing important in this small island nation. Also, occupational therapist salary in New Zealand range from $32,000 to $75,000 per annum. Its quite a huge range covering fresh graduates to highly experienced therapists. However, occupational therapist salary has been growing slowly over the last few years with a median pay of $55,000 per annum.
In 2004, there were 1800 active Occupational therapists working in New Zealand according to Occupational therapy board of New Zealand. This is therapist mainly dominated by female workers. This was evident in New Zealand Statistics as well with 89% of them female and 15.1% of OTs work less than 80 hours per month.
Because of their important role, OTs form a core part of the medical system of every country. Henceforth, there has been an annual average growth of more than 4% in New Zealand between 1991 and 2001.{} There were a number of reasons for this sustained level of growth such as: increase in the allocation of money from the government for the mental health sector leading to growth in the number of OTs working in mental health, and an ageing population which indirectly leads to increase in the demand of rehabilitative health services.
Considering the historical factors are still very much into play, they will keep driving the demand for Occupational Therapists in foreseeable future as well. Furthermore, New Zealand Government has allocated more money into health services strategies which will lead to increased demand for this profession. Some of these policy initiatives are.
1. Increased Focus on Individuals suffering from disability to help them to fully integrate them within the wider society. 2. Increased Support for Older People focussing on coordinated, responsive and preventative health and disability for individuals older than 65. 3. Primary health Care Initiative: Renewed focus and drive on implementation of initiatives to keep NZ at the forefront of providing high quality services to Residents.
Furthermore, future prospects of this profession look good as the baby boomer generation retire, a period when the incidence of heart attack and stroke increases. This will result in a significant deman for even more occupational therapists. However, one can only hope that the occupational therapist salary would also grow simultaneously with increased work load on the profession.