Patricia Higgins
Patricia Higgins, MS, OTR serves as the Academic Fieldwork Coordinator for the Occupational Therapy Department. Current scholarly interests revolve around student clinical placements and success, emerging practice areas of Occupational therapy, and professionalism among students. She has been practicing as an occupational therapist since 2005. Ms. Higgins has worked in a variety of adult rehabilitation therapeutic settings including inpatient rehabilitation, outpatient rehabilitation, day hospital, subacute rehabilitation, and homecare, with an overarching interest and expertise working with clients with neurological conditions. She is certified in LSVT BIG, Congestive Heart Failure, and Kinesiotaping. Ms. Higgins continues to provide OT services and student fieldwork supervision at the Kean University OT Community Cares Clinic.
Ms. Higgins is a member of both the national and state occupational therapy associations, AOTA and NJOTA. Ms. Higgins has presented at multiple state and local conferences on topics including: Visual Rehabilitation, Serial Casting, Pusher Syndrome, Occupational Therapy treatment for clients with Parkinson’s Disease, Treatment Techniques for a Hemiplegic Upper Extremity, and Returning to the Kitchen following a Stroke.
Teaching Philosophy
My teaching philosophy stems from my passion and dedication to the field of Occupational Therapy. I choose to first educate the students on a specific area of practice in order to broaden their knowledge base and familiarity with the subject, actively engage discussions to further the level of understanding in regards to real life scenarios in OT practice and most importantly have my students participate in hands on active learning opportunities. My goal is to ensure my students fully understand concepts, as opposed to reciting information.