The short version. An Occupational Therapist resume is screened on license, setting, and functional caseload before anything else. Lead with a summary that names your setting (acute care, inpatient rehab, SNF, outpatient, pediatrics/school-based, home health, hand therapy, or mental health), your OTR/L and NBCOT credentials, and a headline outcome tied to function. Then prove impact the OT way: ADL and IADL gains, caseload and productivity, documentation compliance, and patient progress on standardized measures like the FIM or COPM. Mirror the real OT keywords the ATS searches for (occupational profile, activities of daily living, therapeutic activity, fine motor, splinting, adaptive equipment, ICD-10) and name your EMR. Keep it to one page until you have lead or fieldwork-educator scope. Typical US pay runs roughly $80,000–$105,000, median near $96,000.
What an Occupational Therapist actually does
An Occupational Therapist (OT) is a licensed clinician who helps people of all ages do the everyday activities — the occupations — that give their lives meaning and independence: dressing, bathing, eating, cooking, returning to school or work, managing a home, and participating in the community. Where a physical therapist concentrates on movement, strength, and gait, an OT works on the whole picture of function and participation: the cognitive, fine-motor, visual-perceptual, sensory, and environmental pieces that decide whether a patient can actually live independently after an injury, illness, surgery, stroke, or developmental difference. OTs hold a master's (MOT/MSOT) or doctoral (OTD) degree, pass the NBCOT certification exam to become an OTR (Registered Occupational Therapist), and practice under a state license — usually written together as OTR/L.
The work changes shape with the setting — a school-based OT and an acute-care OT share a license but almost nothing else day to day — but the core responsibilities hold across settings:
- Occupational profile and evaluation. Interview the patient and family, build an occupational profile, and assess performance — ADLs and IADLs, range of motion and strength, fine and gross motor skills, cognition, visual-perceptual and sensory processing, and the home or school environment — using standardized assessments to establish a baseline and prognosis.
- Plan of care and goal-setting. Write measurable, occupation-based goals (for example, "dress upper body with modified independence") and design an intervention plan that fits physician orders, payer rules, and what the patient most wants to get back to.
- Therapeutic intervention. Deliver ADL and IADL retraining, therapeutic activity and exercise, neuromuscular and motor-control work, cognitive rehabilitation, sensory integration, and task adaptation — always grading the activity to the just-right challenge.
- Adaptive equipment and home modification. Recommend, fit, and train patients on adaptive equipment and durable medical equipment (DME), assistive technology, and home modifications so the environment supports independence and safety.
- Splinting and orthotic fabrication. Fabricate and fit custom orthoses and splints (especially in hand therapy and upper-extremity rehab) and progress wear schedules.
- Documentation and coding. Write defensible evaluations, daily and progress notes, and discharge summaries; apply ICD-10 diagnosis and CPT treatment codes; and meet Medicare and payer documentation rules so the visit is reimbursable.
- Education, training, and coordination. Teach patients, families, caregivers, and teachers; direct the care delivered by certified occupational therapy assistants (COTAs); collaborate with PT, speech, nursing, physicians, and case managers; and coordinate safe discharge or transition.
- Outcomes and productivity. Track progress on validated measures (FIM, COPM, Sensory Profile, and others), hit productivity targets, and move patients toward discharge at a lower level of care.
The throughline is ownership of a patient's return to meaningful daily activity under clinical and reimbursement constraints. That is exactly what your resume has to prove — not that you "provided occupational therapy," but that you carried a real caseload, documented defensibly, and moved patients toward measurable independence in the activities that matter to them.
What recruiters & ATS look for
An Occupational Therapist resume gets read in two passes. First, an applicant tracking system (or a clinical recruiter running a keyword search) checks for the non-negotiables: an active license, an OTR/L credential with NBCOT certification, and the right clinical setting. A resume missing a clear credentials line is one of the fastest things to get filtered out, because credentialing can't proceed without it. Then a hiring manager — a rehab director, lead OT, or school-program coordinator — spends about ten seconds deciding whether you can carry a full caseload and document defensibly at the scope they need.
To clear the screen, your resume needs the right keywords (covered below) in clean formatting: a single-column layout, standard section headings, real selectable text rather than skills baked into an image, the exact job title mirrored from the posting, and a credentials line that is impossible to miss. To win the human, it needs quantified, occupation-based ownership in the top third — caseload, setting, ADL/IADL outcomes, and compliance. The single biggest tell of a copied template is borrowing physical-therapy language: a strong OT resume talks about occupational profiles, ADLs, and adaptive equipment, not gait and strength alone.
| Signal they want | How it shows up on a strong OT resume |
|---|---|
| Licensure & credentials | "OTR/L · NBCOT certified · Licensed OT (TX, #OT-XXXXX) · CHT · BLS" — visible in the top third, not buried |
| Right setting | Acute care, inpatient rehab, SNF, outpatient, pediatrics/school-based, home health, hand therapy, or mental health named explicitly |
| Caseload & productivity | "Managed a 10–12 patient daily caseload at 90%+ productivity" — scope and efficiency in one line |
| Documentation rigor | On-time note rate, audit pass rate, ICD-10/CPT accuracy, and the EMR you use |
| Functional outcomes | Gains on standardized measures (FIM, COPM, Sensory Profile), ADL/IADL independence, discharge to home |
| Specialty & technique | Splinting/orthotic fabrication, sensory integration, hand therapy, cognitive rehab, or low-vision work relevant to the role |
Full Occupational Therapist resume example
Here is a complete, realistic sample for an experienced inpatient-rehab and outpatient OT. Notice that the credentials are impossible to miss, the summary names a setting and a headline metric, every experience bullet pairs an action with a quantified functional result, and the skills line is dense with genuine, defensible OT keywords.
Jordan T. Avila, OTR/L, CHT
Occupational Therapist — Inpatient Rehab & Outpatient Hand Therapy
Austin, TX · jordan.avila@email.com · (512) 555-0146 · linkedin.com/in/jordanavila-otr · NPI on request
Licenses & Certifications
OTR/L — Registered & Licensed Occupational Therapist · NBCOT certified (active) · Licensed OT: Texas (#OT.0098765, active), New Mexico (active) · CHT — Certified Hand Therapist · BLS/CPR (AHA) · LSVT BIG certified · AOTA member
Professional Summary
Outcome-driven Occupational Therapist with 8+ years across inpatient rehabilitation and outpatient hand therapy, carrying a full 10–12 patient daily caseload at 92%+ productivity with 100% on-time documentation. Certified Hand Therapist who builds occupation-based plans of care, fabricates custom orthoses, and consistently advances patients from dependent to modified-independent ADL status ahead of discharge benchmark. Fieldwork educator for OT and COTA students and COTA supervisor.
Core Skills
Clinical: Occupational profile & evaluation · ADL & IADL retraining · Therapeutic activity · Neuromuscular re-education · Cognitive rehabilitation · Fine motor & visual-perceptual training · Splinting & orthotic fabrication · Adaptive equipment & DME · Home modification
Documentation: ICD-10 & CPT coding · Medicare & payer compliance · Outcome measures (FIM, COPM, DASH) · Discharge planning
Systems: Epic · Net Health · Casamba · Microsoft Office
Clinical Experience
Hill Country Inpatient Rehabilitation & Hand Center · Austin, TX
- Manage a 10–12 patient daily caseload across stroke, spinal-cord, and upper-extremity populations at 92%+ productivity while maintaining 100% on-time documentation in Epic.
- Advanced 85% of inpatient-rehab patients to modified-independent ADL status, improving average FIM self-care scores 9 points before discharge.
- Fabricated 120+ custom orthoses per year for post-surgical hand and wrist patients, returning 90%+ to functional grip and pinch within protocol benchmarks.
- Increased discharge-to-home rate 14% by standardizing home-evaluation and adaptive-equipment recommendations with case management.
- Serve as fieldwork educator for 8+ OT and COTA students and supervise 2 COTAs, mentoring on orthotic fabrication and defensible documentation.
- Passed 100% of payer and Medicare documentation audits over 3 years with zero clawbacks.
Lone Star Skilled Nursing & Rehabilitation · Round Rock, TX
- Evaluated and treated a skilled-nursing caseload of 9–11 residents daily, building occupation-based plans of care from evaluation through discharge.
- Reduced falls among high-risk residents 28% by introducing a cognitive-safety and adaptive-equipment screening into the OT evaluation.
- Improved average COPM performance and satisfaction scores 3+ points across the IADL caseload by grading therapeutic activity to each resident's prior level of function.
Central Texas Regional Medical Center · Austin, TX
- Provided bedside evaluation, early ADL retraining, and adaptive-equipment training for post-surgical and medically complex inpatients, coordinating safe discharge with the rehab team.
Education
Master of Occupational Therapy (MOT) — Texas Woman's University, 2016
B.S., Health Sciences — The University of Texas at Austin, 2014
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Build yours free →Key hard & soft skills for Occupational Therapists
Hiring managers weight a specific blend. The hard skills get you past the credentialing screen and prove you can carry a caseload safely; the soft skills are what make an OT effective with patients, families, and the care team — and the best resumes demonstrate the soft skills inside bullets rather than just listing them.
Hard skills
- Occupational profile, evaluation, and standardized assessment
- ADL and IADL retraining and task adaptation
- Plan of care development and occupation-based goal-setting
- Therapeutic activity, neuromuscular, and motor-control intervention
- Fine motor, visual-perceptual, and cognitive rehabilitation
- Sensory integration and processing (especially pediatrics)
- Splinting and orthotic fabrication; adaptive equipment and DME
- Home modification and assistive technology
- Standardized outcome measures (FIM, COPM, Sensory Profile, DASH)
- ICD-10 / CPT coding and Medicare/payer-compliant documentation
- EMR proficiency (Epic, Net Health, Casamba, or WebPT)
Soft skills
- Patient and family rapport, empathy, and motivational coaching
- Clear collaboration with PT, speech, nursing, physicians, and teachers
- Clinical reasoning and activity analysis under time pressure
- Supervision and mentorship of COTAs, aides, and students
- Time management across a full caseload without cutting corners on documentation
- Creativity in grading activities to the "just-right challenge"
ATS keywords for an Occupational Therapist resume
These are the terms recruiters and applicant tracking systems search for most often in OT hiring. Use the ones you genuinely have, mirror the posting's exact phrasing, and prove each inside an accomplishment rather than parking it in a list. Where a term has a common acronym, include both forms once.
Realistic salary range
Most US Occupational Therapist roles pay roughly $80,000 to $105,000, with a national median near $96,000. New grads and school-based or community OTs typically start around $70,000–$82,000; experienced clinicians across most settings cluster in the $88,000–$100,000 range; and home health, skilled nursing, travel OT, hand therapy, and lead or specialized roles in higher-cost metros commonly reach $105,000–$125,000 or more. The biggest drivers of the spread are setting (home health and SNF often pay above school-based and outpatient), geography (high-cost and rural-shortage areas pay a premium), productivity expectations, and whether the role is salaried, per-visit, or per-diem. A specialty credential — CHT, assistive technology, or LSVT — and bilingual ability can each add a meaningful premium. Treat any single number as a starting point and check it against current local data with our Salary Analyzer before you negotiate.
Common Occupational Therapist resume mistakes
Frequently asked questions
Lead with a summary that names your setting (acute care, inpatient rehab, skilled nursing, outpatient, pediatrics/school-based, home health, hand therapy, or mental health), your license status, and a headline outcome tied to function. Make your OTR/L credential, NBCOT certification, active state licensure, and certifications (BLS/CPR plus any specialties like CHT, SIPT, or assistive technology) impossible to miss. Prove impact through quantified bullets centered on occupation: ADL and IADL gains, caseload size, documentation compliance, productivity, and patient outcomes on standardized measures like the FIM or COPM. Include a skills line with genuine OT keywords — occupational profile, activities of daily living, therapeutic activity, fine motor, splinting, adaptive equipment, ICD-10 — plus your EMR. Recruiters screen first for an active license and the right setting, then for evidence you carry a full caseload and document defensibly.
They look similar in format but read very differently to a rehab hiring manager. An occupational therapist's resume is organized around occupation and participation — activities of daily living (ADLs), instrumental ADLs, cognition, fine motor and visual-perceptual skills, sensory processing, and adaptive equipment that lets a patient return to self-care, school, work, or home. A physical therapist's resume centers on gross movement, gait, strength, and mobility. Use OT-specific language: occupational profile, ADL/IADL retraining, therapeutic activity, splinting and orthotic fabrication, home modification, and the FIM or COPM rather than gait-and-balance terminology. Mirroring the wrong discipline's keywords is one of the fastest ways to look like you copied a generic template.
The terms recruiters and applicant tracking systems search for most are: OTR/L, registered occupational therapist, occupational profile, activities of daily living (ADL), instrumental ADL (IADL), plan of care, therapeutic activity, fine motor and visual-perceptual skills, sensory integration, cognitive rehabilitation, splinting and orthotic fabrication, adaptive equipment and durable medical equipment (DME), home modification, ICD-10 and CPT coding, discharge planning, and your EMR (Epic, Net Health, Casamba, or WebPT). Setting keywords matter too — acute care, inpatient rehabilitation, skilled nursing facility (SNF), outpatient, pediatrics, school-based, home health, hand therapy, and mental health. Add specialty credentials you hold, such as CHT, SIPT, LSVT BIG, or assistive technology. Mirror the exact phrasing from the posting and prove each term inside a bullet.
One page for new grads and most clinicians with under ten years of experience; two pages only once you have lead, fieldwork-educator, or management scope plus program-development, research, or specialty work worth detailing. License, certification, and clinical setting must be visible in the top third either way. Density beats length — a tight one-page resume of quantified ADL outcomes and caseload outperforms two pages of generic duties.
Tie each bullet to a number a rehab director cares about: caseload (patients or units per day), productivity percentage, documentation compliance and on-time note rate, FIM or COPM gains, percentage of patients discharged to a lower level of care or back home, fall or re-hospitalization reductions, and goals met within the plan of care. Use the format "achieved [functional outcome] by [number] through [action]" — for example, "Advanced 85% of inpatient-rehab patients to modified-independent ADL status, improving average FIM self-care scores 9 points before discharge." If you can't share exact figures, use credible relative measures or ranges, but never ship a bullet with no result.
Most US Occupational Therapist roles pay roughly $80,000 to $105,000, with a national median near $96,000. New grads and school-based or community OTs often start around $70,000–$82,000; experienced clinicians across most settings cluster in the $88,000–$100,000 range; and home health, skilled nursing, travel OT, hand therapy, and lead or specialized roles in higher-cost metros commonly reach $105,000–$125,000 or more. Setting, geography, productivity expectations, and per-visit versus salaried structure drive most of the spread.
Yes. List your OTR/L designation, your NBCOT certification, the states where you hold an active OT license (license numbers optional but name the states), and your eligibility for or possession of an NPI. Recruiters and credentialing teams screen for an active, unencumbered license before anything else, and a missing or unclear credentials line is one of the fastest ways to get filtered out. Add BLS/CPR and any board or specialty certifications — CHT, SIPT, assistive technology, or LSVT — in the same section.
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