Sian’s story: “We don’t go into occupational therapy to spend our lives filling in documents”

When someone contacts Neath Port Talbot Council for support, Sian McCarthy and her team are often the first people they speak to. 

As an Occupational Therapist (OT) working in the council’s front door service, Sian helps people understand their options, whether that’s career advice, equipment to support daily life or a referral for further assessment.  

At its core, her role is about listening and understanding what people need. 

But too often, paperwork gets in the way of that listening. 

Sian has been using Notes to bridge that gap, reducing her admin load so she can stay present with the individuals she supports.

Can you tell me more about your role?

Sian: I’m an Occupational Therapist working within the front door service at Neath Port Talbot Council. Our team is made up of OTs, social workers, and managers, and we’re essentially the first point of contact for individuals reaching out to the local authority for support. We consider strengths, risk, need, and the person’s own aspirations, and that requires a collaborative approach. 

We might discuss information, advice, or equipment to support a person’s daily life, or signpost them to third sector organisations and community services that can offer practical or emotional support. It’s about empowering people to make informed choices and maintain their independence wherever possible. Where someone’s outcomes require further comprehensive assessment, we make onward referrals to longer term services. It’s a fast-paced environment, but it’s also incredibly rewarding because we’re often able to make a real difference at an early stage.

What do you like most about your role?

Sian: I really love working with people. What’s really important to me is actually helping them to achieve what's important to them. It might be that we go in as professionals and can see various different things that might be beneficial, but if that's not important to somebody, then that's not going to support them. We aim to keep people as independent as we possibly can and achieve the things that matter to them, and there could be a million variations on how we do that depending on what's important to them.

What was your first impression of Notes?

Sian: I'm very pro tech and anything that can streamline what we're doing. It cuts down on the amount of time we spend writing and documenting what we're doing so that we can spend more time with people, build rapport, and find out what's actually going on. 

There's a lot of duplication in our line of work, because you have to fill in an assessment form, maybe write to the GP, then send a letter to the person and do an onward referral. With Notes, you can ask the system to adapt the information for your specific requirement, which saves so much time.

This extra time is useful for things like continuing professional development (CPD), talking cases over with colleagues and making sure the decisions we're making are appropriate and backed by the latest evidence based research.

What impact has the tool had on your interactions with clients?

Sian: When we go on a visit, it is really important to get the person's voice and their exact words in the assessment. When handwriting notes and trying to get down people's exact words, you feel like you’re constantly looking at your knees, trying to write notes instead of giving that person your attention and focusing on what they're saying and building that rapport. It’s a bit of a barrier. With Notes, I can put the phone down, and then not have to think about it because it's taking down everything that's being said. It takes away that worry about missing things, or bits of paper going missing that you've written notes on. 

Do you think this could speed up waiting times for assessments?

Sian: With Notes, we can get a referral written up and sent off to the appropriate service faster than we would have done before. That's going to have a knock-on effect on people waiting for an assessment - they can get it faster because we've been able to forward the previous referral faster.

Once the referral is allocated to us, we have to make contact with that person within seven days. I don't think there's been anyone on my caseload for a long time where I haven't been able to do that. I think Notes has a big impact on that because it gives us the time to be able to do it and to get people referred onto the places they need to go faster.

Do you think tools like Notes can help with staff retention?

Sian: AI can definitely help with staff retention by improving well-being, reducing stress, giving people time to focus on their career and their development as professionals. We don't go into OT to spend all our lives filling in documents. We go into OT to spend time with people, helping people achieve their goals. So if we're able to do that, that's going to help keep professionals in their jobs, giving the council long-term highly qualified staff.

Are there any final thoughts you'd like to share?

Sian: I just really like it, and I think it's a really positive step. So I'm really pleased that we started using Notes as a local authority, and hopefully we can extend the use of it and pass on that positive feedback to other local authorities who might be considering it in the future. 

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