All About Sleep & OT Practice Webinar Bundle
This recorded five-part CPD program designed to elevate your occupational therapy practice through the science of sleep. Discover how sleep impacts health, participation, and therapy outcomes — and how OTs can play a vital role in sleep assessment and support across all ages and settings.
Program Overview
Sleep is amazing. Sleep + OT is even more amazing. Good sleep underpins every aspect of good health, well-being, participation and performance. Poor sleep can be devastating for our clients and their families and can completely undermine the great things that occupational therapists offer.
OTs need to know about sleep – to understand how it impacts our assessments and interventions, and to discover and share the important, unique and diverse scope of practice that we can bring to individual and family-centred sleep solutions. When we learn all about sleep, and apply our OT lens, we can take sleep support to a higher level of evidence-informed, client-centred collaborative practice.
In this series, you will learn about Sleep (and circadian science) and will be supported to apply this knowledge to your clinical practice – all ages, all conditions, all practice settings.
Webinar 1 (Sue McCabe) – This webinar was recorded on the 28th July 2025.
Sleep Matters - it's OT business
There's lots we need to know about sleep (and circadian) science. In this session Sue provided an overview of sleep (and circadian science) – why it matters, how it works, knowing about sleep conditions vs sleep problems, integrating sleep and circadian science into OT knowledge and models of practice. With context of the ICF framework (thinking about body structures and functions, activity, participation, environments and personal factors) we explored and illustrated how this knowledge is relevant to clinicians working with clients of all ages and all conditions, in all practice settings.
Webinar 2 (Annie O’Connell) – This webinar was recorded on the 4th August 2025.
Identifying and Addressing sleep problems in children and teenagers with developmental conditions. In this session Annie provided an overview of common sleep problems, and include information on screening, assessment, interviews, and setting goals to support sleep and monitor progress. This was the initial framework to develop a sleep intervention and is strongly recommended for therapists who are beginning to explore sleep.
Annie used sleep in children and teenagers with developmental conditions as her case examples, with scope to translate this info to all ages, all conditions.
Webinar 3 (Sue McCabe) – This webinar was recorded on the 18th August 2025.
Thermoregulation and sleep. In this session Sue provided an overview of current knowledge about thermoregulation and thermal comfort, and how these impact on all aspects of 24hour function – with focus on getting to sleep, staying asleep and sleeping well. This information was relevant to and included case examples of clients of all ages with all conditions (neurological, developmental, musculo-skeletal, neuro-motor, mental health). It included information about assistive technology that can support thermoregulation and thermal comfort for sleep.
Webinar 4 (Sue McCabe) – This webinar was recorded on the 1st September 2025
Sensory processing and sleep. In this session Sue provided an overview of current models of understanding of sensory processing and sensory regulation with focus on impact on clients’ arousal, vigilance, readiness for sleep and sleep quality and maintenance. Again, this session included current evidence and practical strategies for assessing and supporting sensory comfort for settling and sleep, and explored relevance to clients of all ages, all conditions within context of the ICF.
Webinar 5 (Sue McCabe) – This webinar was recorded on the 15th September 2025
Supporting posture and mobility for sleep. In this session we considered the importance of positioning and mobility support for people with neurological, neuro-motor, musculoskeletal and developmental conditions (we know that people with developmental conditions also have challenges with posture and mobility!). We considered the impact of lying position on pain, respiration, GI function, pressure care and overall comfort for sleep. We used case examples to illustrate options for assessment and provision of assistive technology to support posture and mobility for sleep and rest.
WHO SHOULD ATTEND?
This series is relevant for OTs at all stages of their career.
CPD HOURS
Total CPD claimable workshop hours: 7.5
A certificate of attendance will be issued upon completion of the full course. Please allow up to 48 hours for the certificate to appear in your CPD tracker.
ACCESS
The recording and resources will be available in your OTA Account for 12 weeks from the date of purchase.
REGISTRATION FEES
OTA Member: TBD
Student / New Graduate: $TBD
Non Member: $TBD
(All pricing is inclusive of GST)
Members must be logged in with username and password in order to register at the member rate.
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DISCLAIMER
All information is correct at the time of publication. OTA reserves the right to alter or delete items from the CPD calendar as required, and takes no responsibility for any errors, omissions and changes.All workshop resources including copies of the presentation, along with all supporting documents and links are not for distribution and are the property of the presenter.
An OTA staff member or representative may be photographing this event for use in OTA publications and/ or on OTA social media sites. If you do not wish to be photographed, or have your image published please make this known to the OTA representative at your course or contact OTA on 1300 682 878 or at info@otaus.com.au
TERMS AND CONDITIONS (T&C)
T&C's are available here
CONTACT US
Please direct all enquiries to info@otaus.com.au or phone 1300 682 878
Presented By
Sue McCabe
BSc, MSc, PhD
Graduating in WA in 1980, Sue has worked in neuro and spinal rehab, community paediatrics, and assistive technology (home mods, seating and lying positioning). During her 20+years in AT she noted the often-devastating impact that sleep problems had on clients and their caregivers, and the gaps in allied health knowledge and services around this. This drove her MSc and PhD studies into the diverse factors affecting sleep of children with complex neuro-motor conditions, with a focus on sleep and thermoregulation. With a Churchill Fellowship, she travelled to the UK and Canada to learn from experts in sleep/disability and has continued to collaborate on international sleep training and research projects. She has recently ceased clinical practice and now focuses on knowledge sharing (training, peer supervision, writing) with OT and other allied health and sleep research colleagues. Sue loves the ICF as a framework for understanding collaborative action to support sleep of people of all ages, all conditions. She loves translating sleep & circadian science through the unique scope of our person-centred OT lens. She loves the idea of developing a strong community of sleep knowledge and practice for OTs.
Annie O’Connell
Occupational Therapist MAppSc (OT)
Annie is an occupational therapist with over 40 years of experience and has worked in a variety of paediatric settings in Australia and overseas. Similar to Sue, she realized the impact of inadequate sleep on the quality of life for families. In 2003 Annie completed her M.App.Sc (OT) by research investigating ‘Sleep Disturbance in Children with Autism and the use of a Waterbed’. From 2003 to 2015 Annie was the Lead Practitioner for the ‘Sleepwise project’ addressing sleep disturbance in young people with developmental disabilities developed by Child and Youth Services, Disability Services in SA. Two research grants from the Apex Foundation For Research Into Intellectual Disability Limited allowed the evaluation of the Sleepwise approach for children 2–6 years of age and 8–18 years of age. She has been sharing this sleep assessment and intervention for over 20 years in face to face and online training. Annie was also awarded a Churchill Fellowship in 2009 to further explore the management of sleep disturbance in the UK, USA and Canada. She feels strongly that all OTs need knowledge of sleep for a holistic approach with clients.