Licensure Information

Licensure laws Click here.

 All occupational therapists and occupational therapy assistants must be licensed to work in the state of New Jersey. The New Jersey Occupational Therapy Advisory Council manages licensure:  Click here to go to their website.

For applications for New Jersey State OT/OTA licensure on-line, click here.
Occupational Therapy Licensure in the State of New Jersey is handled through the Department of Law and Public Safety, Division of Consumer Affairs.


The Occupational Therapy license is issued by the Occupational Therapy Advisory Council, which is made up of seven members who are appointed by the Governor. Four of the members are licensed occupational therapists with at least five years experience, one is a certified occupational therapy assistant, and two members who are "public" members. 
Occupational Therapy has had a licensure act in New Jersey since 1993. All therapists were required to be licensed as of March 15, 2000

Acceptable Abbreviations

In the State of New Jersey, occupational therapists and occupational therapy assistants should only use "O.T." or "O.T.A." after their names. Pursuant to N.J.A.C. 13:44K-8.3 (b), a licensee shall use only the title or designation corresponding to his or her license.

This requirement has also been clarified during the comment period of the rule adoption.

A COMMENT: Several commenters have questions regarding signing official documents as a licensee. They want to know when they can begin signing documents with license numbers and what abbreviations a licensee should use after his or her name.

A RESPONSE: Licensees may use their license number once they have been issued a license. The only abbreviations a licensee may use after his or her name are O.T., for occupational therapists, or O.T.A., for occupational therapy assistants.

N.J.A.C

. 13:44K-10.1 Preparation and maintenance of client records. The full name, as it appears on the license, of the licensee who rendered care, identification of licensure status as either an occupational therapist or occupational therapy assistant, license number and designated supervisor, if applicable. This information shall be legible and shall appear at least once on each page of the client record.

 

To view the Occupational Therapy Advisory Council Statutes on their own website, click here.

Disclaimer:
All of the information contained on this website is based on information available to Board of Directors members. 
Official information is only available from:
State of New Jersey, Dept. of Law and Public Safety
Division of Consumer Affairs - Occupational Therapy Advisory Council
124 Halsey Street, 6th Floor, P. O. Box 45037 
Newark, N J 07101
973-504-6570

 Occupational Therapy Advisory Council Meetings:
Meetings and agenda information can be found on their webpage. CLICK HERE

 

PAMs 

The use of Physical Agent Modalities (PAMs) is regulated in the state of New Jersey.  To view the regulations, you can click here.   We hope the bullet points below will help to ameliorate some of the confusion:

  • This is a NJ state regulation, not national--you won't find best info @ AOTA website.. 
  • Specific information can be found on the NJ OccupationalTherapy Advisory Council website where the actual regulations can also be found. 
  • The certification requirement applies to any OT licensed in NJ who uses/or plans to use Advanced Physical Agent Modalities in his/her practice. 
  • On-line courses do not qualify as course needs to be active-have "didactic"interaction- between the presenter & participant.Observation of participant's application of each modality by the presenter is also a requirement. 
  • NJ OT Advisory Council approves courses which meet all regulation requirements.  
  • A therapist may submit information the the Advisory Council regarding courses already taken to see if they qualify toward the certification requirement. 
  • There is no partial certification which allows for provision of some advanced PAM's & not others. A therapist must meet certificaton requirements for all Advanced PAM's to use any advanced PAM's in practice. 
  • The effective date for certification to use advanced PAM's in NJ is May 4, 2011. There is no extension beyond this date. 
  • More information can be obtained from the NJ OT Advisory Council 
  • Best thing  for an OT who uses or plans to use advanced PAMs is to take a NJ OT Advisory Council approved course

 Extension of Modalities Regs!

"N.J.A.C. 13:44K-5.4 (l) Use of physical agent modalities- Training Deadline Extension" 

The Division of Consumer Affairs, in consultation with the Council, has determined to extend the May 4, 2010 deadline in N.J.A.C. 13:44K-5.4(l) for licensed occupational therapists to receive advanced physical agent modalities training. The new deadline will be May 4, 2011.

 School Certification

Occupational therapists wishing to practice in the NJ school system have to obtain a school occupational therapy certificate.  Click here to be redirected to the NJ Department of education's website on an "overview to certification in New Jersey".  Occupational therapists fall under Educational Services Personnel.