Narelle Henwood
Senior Occupational Therapist | Medico-legal Specialist
Narelle Henwood is an Occupational Therapist with over 35 years' experience comprising community-based assessment and occupational rehabilitation services, Narelle has spent the past 12 years teaching undergraduate occupational therapy students and prepared many written documents and publications. Narelle is known for her clear, readable and detailed reports.
Narelle has a wide range of knowledge acquired when working with people of all ages. She has expertise in the areas of culturally sensitive practice, children’s development, ASD, cerebral palsy, intellectual disability, work injuries, chronic pain, mental health, psychological injury, traumatic brain injury, stroke and cognitive impairment. Narelle has high level skills in explaining the effect of illness or impairment on a person’s functional capacity to do their usual daily activities at home, at work or in the community.
Personally, Narelle uses an inclusive and friendly approach to her work. She is highly regarded by clients for being down to earth, kind and professional.
Narelle has had many roles in her long Occupational Therapy career. Narelle spent most of her early career in neurological rehabilitation for stroke, head injury and brain impairments following surgical treatment. Narelle’s role with WorkCover Queensland involved injury rehabilitation and return to work interventions. Later, Narelle developed her paediatric specialty in education and community health settings. Narelle led a team of multidisciplinary child development allied health professionals in regional Queensland. She was part of a State Wide child Development Advisory group and a co-author of clinical paediatric practice guideline documents. Narelle has experience briefing legal staff as a potential expert witness.
More recently, Narelle has also been delivering clinical mentoring for health professionals who are NDIS providers. She has supported graduate occupational therapists in their therapy planning, documentation and preparation for client’s NDIS tribunal meetings.
