“I want something medical, but not too medical.” Those were the words that launched a high school senior on a more than 40-year love affair.

The words were a response to a career question from Barb’s high school counselor. The counselor had a friend, or perhaps a friend of a friend, named Jan. Jan was an Occupational Therapist, an “OT.” While Barb had never heard of the field, she agreed to spend a day shadowing the woman in the hospital where she practiced her craft. Jan was a little dynamo, and Barb was hooked. She applied to and was admitted into the Occupational Therapy program at the University of Illinois for the following year.

Three years of a general curriculum at Champaign-Urbana were followed by 18 months of specialized OT training at U of I’s west side Chicago medical center campus. This included clinical rotations around Chicagoland–and also included meeting me, a medical student and a co-resident in the med center dorm.

We picked out an engagement ring while Barb was taking her clinical exams. I married my OTR (registered Occupational Therapist) a few months after her graduation. By then she was working full-time at the first of her positions, as a therapist at one of Rush University’s facilities.

As she gained experience, Barb’s career path took her to the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago, and with some prodding from a good friend to Lutheran General Hospital in the northern suburbs. While working as a general therapist at LGH Barb discovered her true calling.

It wasn’t in the pediatrics clinic, where Barb helped out often enough to be exposed to and catch a bad case of chicken pox. It wasn’t with stroke patients needing the standard OT “assistance with daily living” therapy. What Barb was drawn to, and made into her career, was hand therapy–assisting patients, who either following disease, injury, or surgery, required precise and specialized care and instruction to improve the utilization of their hand and arm.

Barb studied hard to learn her craft. Acceptance into the American Society of Hand Therapists was a year-long slog. Barb found a study group to join, and a hand surgeon to sponsor her. We spent many weekends at my Evanston Hospital Laboratory Office, writing up case histories on a first-of-its-kind machine, a word processor. It all paid off, as Barb was one of the few candidates nationwide to pass the difficult ASHT certification exam on their first try.

Barb’s career flourished as a well-liked and well-respected hand therapist throughout the Chicago area. She loved her patients and became involved in their life stories as their professional therapist and personal confidant. She greatly enjoyed being a mentor training a multitude of young professionals, a gaggle we call the “Barbettes.”

Officially, Barb stopped working a few years ago. Of course, that hasn’t stopped her interest in the field. If she has seen you on the street or in a grocery store with your hand in a splint, you can bet she has asked you what your injury was and how it was being treated–and maybe even offered a suggestion or two.

Just yesterday, Barb received a letter from the National Board for Certification in Occupational Therapy, informing her that she had not renewed her membership and was no longer entitled to use the letters OTR, a registered trademark of the Board.

I am not sure if Barb shed a physical tear, but I know there was a mental one. Her illustrious career has truly drawn to a close. But Barb, on behalf of the patients you helped, the surgeons you worked so closely with, and the young professionals you trained so well, I say thank you for a job well done!

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