Disability Programs Specialized Services

This episode originally aired on the Swinging Upside Down podcast on October 24, 2020. October is ADHD Awareness Month, so to start things off, the podcast is revisiting a conversation between DPSS team leader and OT Cynthia Miller-Lautman and her husband Michael.  Michael was diagnosed with ADHD as an adult, he and Cynthia talk about growing up without a diagnosis, getting diagnosed and lear...

Weighted blankets, vests and stuffed animals have become incredibly popular in recent years. They can be incredible helpful for anyone who struggles with sensory regulation. You can buy weighted sensory products online and in many stores, but they should still be used with caution. In 2008, a child with autism died while rolled in weighted blanket and left unsupervised . Since then, the provincial...

Have you ever wondered why someone behaves the way they do? Have you ever wondered what those behaviours are trying to communicate? Applied Behaviour Analysis Trevor Friesen helps us understand what those behaviours are trying to tell us and guides us towards what to do next. Watch this video to learn how this approach can be added to your toolbox.

In this episode, DPSS team member Trevor Friesen introduces us to Applied Behaviour Analysis (or ABA), and talks about some strategies for getting to the root cause of problem behaviours. Trevor also gives some suggestions about how to think about solutions for difficult behaviours.

As part of the DPSS training week in March 2021, Aimee-Elizabeth Parsons and Trevor Friesen did a session entitled “What is ADHD?”. That session was based on Episode 3, which you can watch here . In this episode, Aimee and Trevor tackle some of the questions that they were asked during and after their session. Some of the topics Aimee and Trevor discuss are: Medication: how they work,...

This is Part 3 of our series on Language Disorders and Development. In this episode, Cynthia and Dana answer some questions that were asked after their session on Language Development and Disorders in March 2021. You can watch the first two parts of this series here: Episode 6: How Language Develops Episode 7: How to Stimulate Early Language Skills Some of the questions addressed in this episode a...

During the DPSS training week in March 2021, Cynthia and Bethany did a session on autism spectrum disorder. You can watch the videos from those sessions here: Let’s Talk About Autism Part 1 and Let’s Talk About Autism Part 2 . There were so many good questions at the end of the session, that they couldn’t all be answered. In this episode, Bethany and Cynthia take the time to answ...

During Disability Programs Specialized Services Training Week in March 2021, the episode An Introduction to Disabilities (Episode 2) was played in a live session moderated by Sophie-Anne Scherrer, OT and Dana Lawlor, S-LP. Toward the end of the session, the audience were able to ask questions to Sophie-Anne and Dana. In this episode, Sophie-Anne and Dana revisit their answers to some of the questi...

During the DPSS team’s training week in March 2021, we received a lot of questions at the end of each session. While we were able to answer some of the questions, we couldn’t get to them all. In this episode, Sophie-Anne and Bethany answer some of the questions that were asked during the session “Inclusion: A Community Life For All”, which you can hear or watch by checking...

In this podcast episode, Bethany Hartropp and Sophie-Anne Scherrer, both Occupational Therapists working with the Disability Programs Specialized Services at the CBHSSJB, talk about inclusion and accessibility. We all have different abilities, sometimes because of age, health conditions or injury. This podcast talks about strategies for staying active and having roles in our family and communities...