The Global Status of Occupational Therapy Workforce Research Worldwide: A Scoping Review
Bibliographic record
Abstract
IMPORTANCE: To fulfill their societal role, occupational therapists need to exist in sufficient supply, be equitably distributed, and meet competency standards. Occupational therapy workforce research is instrumental in reaching these aims, but its global status is unknown. OBJECTIVE: To map the volume and nature (topics, methods, geography, funding) of occupational therapy workforce research worldwide. DATA SOURCES: Six scientific databases (MEDLINE/PubMed, Scopus, CINAHL, Web of Science Core Collection, PDQ-Evidence for Informed Health Policymaking, OTseeker), institutional websites, snowballing, and key informants. STUDY SELECTION AND DATA COLLECTION: Research articles of any kind were included if they involved data regarding occupational therapists and addressed 1 of 10 predefined workforce research categories. Two reviewers were used throughout study selection. No language or time restrictions applied, but the synthesis excluded publications before 1996. A linear regression examined the publications' yearly growth. FINDINGS: Seventy-eight studies met the inclusion criteria, 57 of which had been published since 1996. Although significant (p < .01), annual publication growth was weak (0.07 publications/yr). "Attractiveness and retention" was a common topic (27%), and cross-sectional surveys were frequent study designs (53%). Few studies used inferential statistics (39%), focused on resource-poor countries (11%), used standardized instruments (10%), or tested a hypothesis (2%). Only 30% reported funding; these studies had stronger methodology: 65% used inferential statistics, and just 6% used exploratory cross-sectional surveys. CONCLUSIONS AND RELEVANCE: Worldwide occupational therapy workforce research is scant and inequitably distributed, uses suboptimal methods, and is underfunded. Funded studies used stronger methods. Concerted efforts are needed to strengthen occupational therapy workforce research. What This Article Adds: This review highlights the opportunity to develop a stronger, evidence-based strategy for workforce development and professional advocacy.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.051 | 0.141 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.002 | 0.002 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.005 | 0.003 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.065 | 0.082 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.002 | 0.003 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.015 | 0.016 |
| Open science | 0.002 | 0.005 |
| Research integrity | 0.005 | 0.003 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.006 | 0.001 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".