Occupational Therapy may Improve Fibromyalgia Patients' Quality of Life
Financial Effects
This could also result in some financially good news for people who deal with chronic illness. If researchers are able to use their findings to prove effectiveness, they may be able to coax reimbursement claims from health payers. In other words, the result would determine whether or not a patient is able to access the occupational therapy treatment.
“The annual costs of pain management, both from direct medical expenses and from lost workforce productivity, run in the hundreds of billions of dollars," Simon said. “We’ve shown that occupational therapy can ease that burden by helping to improve everyday function and quality of life, one patient at a time.”
Aside from the financial burden being alleviated through this study’s findings, overall health trends may appear. In the past decade or so, the rise in prescription pill abuse and heroin use has been steady and uncomfortable. Many people blame the overprescription of pain killers for the addiction epidemic plaguing the nation. If people can find therapy-based ways for people living with chronic illness to live fulfilling and happy lives without prescribing potentially addictive painkillers, there is less of a chance that that patient will succumb to pill addiction.
