Editorial

Citation

Turner, N. (2017), "Editorial", Irish Journal of Occupational Therapy, Vol. 45 No. 1, pp. 2-3. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJOT-01-2017-0001

Fáilte go dtí an chéad eagrán seo de thoirt 45 den Irisleabhar Piarmheasúnaithe hÉireann Teiripe Shaothair. Welcome to this first issue of the 45th volume of the Irish Journal of Occupational Therapy (IJOT). It gives me great pride to write this Editorial given the milestone it marks. Over the past 40 years, many occupational therapists have given their time to ensure IJOT flourished. In recent years, the future direction of the journal has been discussed in all manner of means including Twitter! On-line publication was deemed to be the best way forward for the Journal, and thankfully, this idea gained the support of the AOTI Council. During 2016, negotiations were concluded with our new publisher Emerald Publishing Services.

I have high hopes for our partnership with Emerald. Under the new arrangement, articles published in IJOT will be done so under a licence know as CC BY 4.0. In short, this means that the content can be accessed and shared freely, including copying and redistributing the published material, once the original work is acknowledged; this is also known as “open access” (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0). I anticipate that this will lead to a growth in readership and also a higher number of submissions. Importantly, this will increase the opportunity to showcase the occupational therapy research, education and clinical practice going on in Ireland to our colleagues around the world. Additionally, occupational therapists working in Ireland will have the opportunity to continuously improve their own professional knowledge through keeping abreast of the international content published in IJOT.

The journal has achieved much since the decision by AOTI to create an academic journal, OT Ireland, in 1977. I wish to thank IJOT’s current Associate Editors of Ms Carol Hills, Ms Sherrie Buckley, Ms Mary Tinley, Ms Rosaleen Kiely, Ms Bethan Collins and Ms Edel O’Neill for their work and continued support. They, and I, would like to take this opportunity to single out Ms Katie Cremin for special praise. Katie undertook the role of Editor of the Journal for many years and laid the foundation for taking this step to becoming an open access online publication. While she is taking a much deserved sabbatical from day-to-day Journal operations, she is keeping a watchful eye from the Editorial Board and will keep me on my toes. Joining Katie on this Editorial Board are Karen Jacobs, Professor, Boston University, USA; Pauline Burke, Chair of AOTI, Ireland; Judith Pettigrew, Senior Lecturer, University of Limerick, Ireland; Eithne Hunt, Programme Leader, University College Cork, Ireland; Elizabeth McKay, Reader, Brunel University, London, UK; Patricia McClure, Associate Head of the School of Health Sciences, Ulster University, Antrim, Northern Ireland; and Chris Lloyd, Senior Research Officer, Griffith University, Brisbane, Australia. I am very grateful to them for agreeing to come on board and assist IJOT in this time of transition and development.

Fittingly this issue commences with an article on the 100 years of Occupational Therapy in Ireland. This work has been completed as part of a programme of research underway in the University of Limerick headed up by Dr Judith Pettigrew. In this particular article, we are provided with fascinating details on the foundations upon which our profession has been built and some of the key of contributors to it (Pettigrew et al., 2017). Following on for this, we have three research articles. In Brennan and Gallagher (2017), we are provided with the findings of a qualitative study on how contextual influences inform gendered occupational choice. A pilot study on equine-assisted therapy using a mixed methods approach by Heffernan (2017) provides us with insight into the impact such an intervention can have and the feasibility of undertaking an evaluation of a therapeutic programme. Views on role emerging placements are the topic dealt with by the research paper of Linnane and Warren (2017). Although widely used in clinical research, there is limited quantitative research on this topic, so I am delighted to be able to publish a paper on this educational matter. The final article is an opinion piece on Supported Employment in mental health. Submitted by Australian colleagues (Machingura and Lloyd, 2017) provide an international perspective on this topical issue for occupational therapists in Ireland. I would also like to encourage readers not to forget the Book Review included. The focus of the book, pain, is a feature of many conditions, and this new publication provides details of the approach of a Canadian occupational therapist, Christine Lefaivre. Thanks to Julie Flanagan for completing this.

Finally, I would like to mention that Emerald is also celebrating a special anniversary in 2017, as they celebrate their 50th birthday so lá breithe shona duit to all at Emerald.