User wellbeing: an entry point for collaboration between occupational therapy and design

Design has become more focused on the user and wellbeing. Occupational therapists can form a valuable bridge between health and design by sharing significant insights about user, environment and occupation. Designers and occupational therapists share a creative, participatory and user-centred perspective. Members of both professions report low rates of collaboration, but that can change with a conscious effort to increase awareness and create opportunities to partner. As with any interprofessional collaboration, both professions’ profit, however, in this case there is an even greater beneficiary: the user.