(a) Occupational Therapists are fully responsible for the planning and delivery of occupational therapy services. They may use non-licensed personnel to extend their services; however, the non-licensed personnel must be under the supervision of an occupational therapy practitioner.

(b) Supervision in this section for occupational therapy aides as defined by the Occupational Therapy Practice Act §454.002 (relating to Definitions) is on-site contact whereby the supervising occupational therapy practitioner is able to respond immediately to the needs of the client.

(c) Supervision of other non-licensed personnel either on-site or via telehealth requires that the occupational therapy practitioner maintain line of sight of the services provided.

(d) When occupational therapy practitioners delegate occupational therapy tasks to non-licensed personnel, the occupational therapy practitioners are responsible for ensuring that this person is adequately trained in the tasks delegated.

(e) The occupational therapy practitioners providing the intervention must interact with the client regarding the client's condition, progress, and/or achievement of goals during each intervention session.

(f) Delegation of tasks to non-licensed personnel includes but is not limited to:

(1) assisting in the construction of adaptive/assistive equipment and splints. The licensee must be attending for any initial applications to the client. When telehealth may be used for the supervision of non-licensed personnel as described in this section, the licensee may attend via telehealth, provided the licensee maintains line of sight of the services provided;

(2) carrying out a predetermined segment or task in the client's care for which the client has demonstrated some previous performance ability in executing the task.

(g) The Non-Licensed Personnel may not:

(1) perform occupational therapy evaluative procedures;

(2) initiate, plan, adjust, or modify occupational therapy procedures;

(3) act on behalf of the occupational therapist in any matter relating to occupational therapy that requires decision making or professional judgments;

(4) write or sign occupational therapy documents in the permanent record. However, non-licensed personnel may record quantitative data for tasks delegated by the supervising occupational therapy practitioner. Any documentation reflecting activities by non-licensed personnel must identify the name and title of that person and the name of the supervising occupational therapy practitioner.

Source Note: The provisions of this §373.1 adopted to be effective January 9, 1995, 19 TexReg 10361; amended to be effective August 31, 1995, 20 TexReg 6337; amended to be effective May 8, 1996, 21 TexReg 3716; amended to be effective March 5, 1997, 22 TexReg 1898; amended to be effective November 4, 1997, 22 TexReg 10752; amended to be effective October 25, 1998, 23 TexReg 11167; amended to be effective July 22, 2001, 26 TexReg 5443; amended to be effective July 22, 2002, 27 TexReg 6546; amended to be effective December 4, 2005, 30 TexReg 7893; amended to be effective September 7, 2009, 34 TexReg 6124; amended to be effective July 1, 2016, 41 TexReg 4052;amended to be effective June 1, 2022, 47 TexReg 3066