Our
Story
OTOT was started by Olivia Thompson and developed out of her passion for supporting children by embracing and celebrating their unique individual differences. Olivia strongly believes that every child and young person experiences the world and learns differently.
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Occupational Therapy (OT) sessions with Olivia are individualised and designed for children to have FUN and enjoy themselves whilst developing fundamental skills. Sessions are tailored around the child’s special interests and through Olivia’s gentle, empathetic and playful approach, the child, parents and educators feel comfortable and safe.
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Olivia feels that these are the building blocks for building trusting meaningful relationships to facilitate children’s development and enhance their learning opportunities. Olivia respects each and every child and young person by listening and honouring their individual voice, while encapsulating their families and other key people’s voices.
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About me
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Olivia Thompson was born and raised in South Africa and after finishing school in South Africa, she immigrated to Australia and studied a Bachelor of Occupational Therapy at the University of Queensland (UQ) in Brisbane. She has worked in the field of paediatrics her whole career gaining experience working in Brisbane, Hong Kong and the United Kingdom. Before starting OTOT, Olivia was most recently the lead occupational therapist at a specialist school in Southwest London.
Olivia is a highly experienced OT having worked across a variety of settings including hospital, clinic, community, home and school environments, NHS and local authorities. She is fully registered with the Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC) and is a Member of Royal College of Occupational Therapy (RCOT).
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Olivia currently works part time (Wed-Fri) in the Neurodevelopmental Team and Complex Feeding Team at the Evelina Children’s Hospital (ELCH), Guys & St. Thomas Hospital.
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Olivia has experience working with children of all strengths and abilities. This includes;
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Working with a range of neurodevelopmental disorders such as autism, ADHD, learning disability, developmental coordination disorder (DCD), dyslexia.
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High quality specialist assessments and report writing in collaboration with parents/ caregivers and other professionals as part of a team.
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Using evidence based therapeutic interventions to ensure consistent and effective outcomes.
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Delivering bespoke trainings to all stakeholders.
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Working with non-speaking children and young people and in using augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) systems.
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Olivia is a trained provider for:
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ADOS-2® - Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule - Second Edition
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DIR Floortime® - Developmental, Individual-differences and Relationship-based model
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Advanced Vital Links Therapeutic Listening®
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SOS Approach to Feeding®
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SCERTS® - Social Communication (SC), Emotional Regulation (ER) and Transactional Support (TS)
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Olivia is passionate about all things health and wellness. She loves spending her weekends cycling, doing yoga and pilates as well as catching up with friends and family. Her holidays are spent finding unique alfresco dining experiences in summery destinations.
SENCo
"I could not recommend Olivia more highly; our pupils look forward to their sessions with her as she creates a positive, non-judgemental atmosphere. The girls she works with are physically and mentally stronger from working with her"
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PARENT
"Olivia has been one of the best things that happened to us in our ASD journey! Her therapies have been absolutely crucial for our child development, how our child interacts with others, their speech level, self regulation, transitions, focused and shared attention, confidence, emotional skills, and so much more all achieved thanks to the fantastic sessions by Olivia!
Olivia has also helped us enormously as parents to advocate for support. Her feedback is thorough, thoughtful and extremely helpful for us and other professionals to carry over the strategies in other settings and at home.
She is extremely proactive and knowledgeable putting forward truly personalised approaches. Importantly our child looks forward to the sessions and finds them a lot of fun! We wish we could have more Olivia’s in our life!"
PARENT
"Olivia always makes each session fun for my son, she quickly understood what he enjoyed and how to encourage him to do activities he wouldn't normally enjoy. He has developed his fine and gross motor skills and coordination hugely since Olivia has been working with him. We'd highly recommend Olivia to all of our friends with children needing OT support."