Julia Wood: Finding purpose, passion and interconnectedness in OT

When alumna Julia Wood told her supervisor during a clinical rotation that she aspired to work as an occupational therapist in the realm of Parkinson’s disease, they told her that role didn’t exist. Wood’s first thought— “then I’ll make one.” That’s the mentality she’s brought to every stage of her career, along with the belief that “the needs of the patient are the only needs that matter.”

Before she went back to school for occupational therapy, Wood used her degree in exercise science to lead a GYROTONIC® and Pilates studio centered around using movement to ease pain from work, gardening, or any other activity that caused body mechanic issues. She thought perhaps physical therapy would be her profession, but when a physical therapist working at her studio told Wood she thinks like an OT, that became her path. 

After graduating from the University of Minnesota’s OT program, Wood stumbled upon a role at the Parkinson Disease and Movement Disorders Center at the University of Pennsylvania. For seven years, she worked in a comprehensive clinic where patients with movement disorders could come see all disciplines in one day.

“With the privilege of specializing came the responsibility to educate others,” Wood said. “People would come looking for education…so then I started doing this professional education piece and I became a certification and training faculty for LSVT Global. I was a little bit of a unicorn, because there weren't a lot of OTs doing Parkinson’s [work].” 

Part of that meant debunking myths on Medicare limits and educating therapists on how to prioritize patient-centered care. Wood said her experience in the OT program supported a sense of “autonomy, agency, and independent thinking,” that enabled her to envision and pursue the kind of specialized work she wanted to do in the profession. Especially in a field as broad as occupational therapy, she said, practitioners have to at some point become their own educators, leaders, and mentors. She also deeply appreciated the program’s education in ethics. 

“In the delivery of health care, a lot of the [ethics] you think, ‘Well, yeah, that's just what you're supposed to do,’ but when you get out in the world, you see how they get challenged a lot of times,” Wood said. “I feel like that strong base in ethics made me a better clinician because I really felt like I understood what my role was.”

Wood decided to transition out of clinical care during the COVID-19 pandemic, during which she realized she required more flexibility to support her daughter, who has autism. While she mourned the loss of direct patient interaction, she found new ways to satisfy that missing piece. Currently, Wood is the director of professional and community education for the Lewy Body Dementia Association, leading educational initiatives for families, creating medical management toolkits, and working with scientific advisors and committees at the association to make medication and dosing recommendations. Reflecting on her time in the OT program, Wood emphasized the importance of finding purpose in one’s work, whichever field it might be in. 

“I'm really grateful for that from my program, my clinicals, my professors— that really strong sense of purpose. I think it's so important,” Wood said. “When you learn to value and really respect the patients that you care for, you inherently have to care for yourself as well and respect your own needs.”