I live in Toronto
If you were coming to Toronto, I could recommend some of the major rehab centres.
However, rehab is probably similar at the hospitals in other provinces too.
In Halifax you may want to contact:
http://www.cdha.nshealth.ca/rehabilitation-supportive-care-services/contact
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Queen_Elizabeth_II_Health_Sciences_Centre
http://rehab.fsnhospitals.com/CA/NS/Halifax
Contact the neurological department at the rehab centre, tell them about your background, and ask if you could volunteer. They wouldn't be able to exist without the help provided by their volunteers. Many do volunteer work at the rehab hospitals while studying for advanced degrees in OT & PT.
Don't contact private clinics...
I can't tell you about OT & PT at the neurological department because they were on a different floor. A while ago, a friend of mine received therapy there following major open heart surgery.
I only had contact with staff at the musculoskeletal department following surgery caused by an injury that the City of Toronto is responsible for.
Patients receive OT & PT every day, in addition to written instructions on exercises to be performed while in bed. During OT patients engage in various repetitive exercises designed to strengthen their upper body, arms, and hands by using different devises/tools, doing puzzles, etc. The OT also advises on equipment & devises that patients are told to purchase in order to be able to function at home. Most of what they push is not needed, while what is most imperative gets overlooked...
Patients are encouraged to take narcotic painkillers in order to be pain free during OT & PT. But, that is much too complicated to elaborate on here. Sufficed to say that I spent a lot of valuable time with the pharmacist and her senior manager, who kept trying to get me to experiment with different narcotics and so-called interchangeable generic drugs that cause major side effects, instead of providing the one painkiller that every layperson is familiar with, but is unavailable at hospitals and that no hospital nurse has ever even seen... The use of narcotic painkillers and the method in which they are administered depends on the hospital.
Since having been discharged from the rehab hospital, I haven't yet received any of the much needed PT. I am hoping to get PT at an outpatient rehab centre that is affiliated with some of Toronto's major teaching hospitals. It's a long rehab process, and in spite of my top grades and the university being very supportive, I have had no choice but to drop out.
People need to know that in order to be able to make it, it's most crucial to have support from family and friends. But, this is not the place to elaborate...
