Recreation therapy employs treatment, education and participation to enable people with physical, cognitive, emotional and/or social limitations to acquire and maintain the skills, knowledge and behaviours that will allow them to enjoy their leisure optimally, function independently with the least amount of assistance and participate as fully as possible in society.

Professionals who are trained, certified, registered and/or licensed in recreation therapy provide this service. According to the Occupational Outlook Handbook 1998, employment of recreational therapists is expected to grow faster than the average for all occupations through the year 2006 because of an anticipated expansion in long term care, physical and psychiatric rehabilitation and services for people with disabilities.

As early as 1975, with the passage of the Education for all Handicapped Children Act in the USA, recreation was identified as a related education service, in the same class as physiotherapy, occupational therapy and speech therapy.

There are three components of recreation, all of which are employed at St. Brendan's Hospital:

Therapeutic recreation service is designed to enhance clients' social, cognitive, emotional and physical functioning and wellbeing. This process includes individualised assessment, development of goals and objectives implementation, documentation and evaluation of client progress.

This is a comprehensive assessment of clients' leisure skills, attitudes, interests and abilities that grades functional strengths. The assessment provides the basis for developing goals and planning for subsequent instructions.

This builds clients' awareness of leisure ? patterns, interests, preferences, opportunities and resources. Clients are exposed to a variety of programmes including bowling, ball play, parachute play, movies, mini golf, shopping, gospel concerts and soca shows. The list of activities goes on to include seasonal art such as kite making, Cup Match flags and beads, Valentine love bags and floral centrepieces for Christmas. Clients are also encouraged to take part in cooking and domestic chores such as housekeeping. St. Brendan's Hospital also offers a petting zoo, a state of the art gym and aquatic programmes for recreation therapy purposes.

"The key to the success of these programmes is flexibility. If therapists are flexible and adapt to individual needs, clients will become engaged in activities that will bring them a new level of fulfilment," said Juliette Basden, recreational therapist and department head at St. Brendan's Hospital.

St. Brendan's Hospital employs seven staff in the recreational therapy, comprised of one recreational therapist and six recreational therapy assistants. This staff work with all of the programmes and patients at St. Brendan's Hospital including psychogeriatrics, learning disabilities, mentally ill ? acute and rehabilitative ? and detox.