OTpall was created with love by Emily VandeKieft as the final deliverable of her doctoral capstone project, which was built in part to answer the following scholarly question: How can occupational therapy be incorporated into palliative care to support the quality of life of palliative care clients and their families?

The daughter of a palliative care physician, Emily grew up around end-of-life care. Upon entering OT school, she became curious about how OT complemented her father's role as a physician, only to learn that OT services are consistently underutilized despite having a compelling evidence base. The more she explored this phenomenon, the more passionate she became about advocating for an increased OT presence in hospice and palliative care.

OTpall was conceived as a response to the limited resources and information Emily could find online. Outside of the literature, internet-based resources explicitly targeting OT practitioners were difficult to find and few in number. With professional knowledge and clinical resources increasingly being moved online, this near total lack of OT-specific resources is effectively widening the gap between what practitioners want to know and what is currently made available to them online.

OTpall is a hopeful answer to the questions OT practitioners may have about their role with serious illness and end-of-life care.