Rachel Pigott works as an occupational therapist and serves as the Director of the Hand Therapy Fellowship at Johns Hopkins. In 1999, she received her bachelor’s in occupational therapy from Towson State University and in 2016 she completed her Master’s in Public Health at The University of Massachusetts Amherst. Rachel is both a certified hand therapist and certified lymphedema therapist. She has served on a volunteer basis with the American Society of Hand Therapists since 2009 and currently serves on the ASHT DEI Committee, ASHT Independent Finance Committee, and as the ASHT Annual Meeting Chair. Rachel is also a past president of ASHT. Rachel’s preferred pronouns are she/her/hers. She has presented on various topics in hand and upper extremity rehabilitation including arthritis, wrist instability, fractures, trauma, patient centered care, orthotics, anatomy of the wrist, gender affirming care for the upper body, and lymphedema management and prevention related to breast cancer related lymphedema.
In our debut episode, we have the current American Society of Hand Therapists President, Rachel Pigott, MPH, OTR/L, CHT, discussing equity in hand and upper extremity therapy. We discuss how equal care is different from equitable care and how we as therapists can work to improve access to therapy services for all people groups. The COVID-19 pandemic required therapists to look at providing our services through a new lens and our profession discovered a way to reach our clients when we couldn’t be face to face. What if now we incorporated this approach to increase access to our specialty services to those clients with limited resources? Rachel also gives us suggestions on how we can advocate for equity in hand and upper extremity therapy.
