A New Tool for Assessment of Professional Skills of Occupational Therapy Students Romero Ayuso, Dulce Nombre de Mari Ortiz Rubio, Araceli Moreno Ramírez Martín Martín, Lydia María Triviño Juárez, José Matías Serrano Guzmán, María Cano Detell, Enrique Novoa Casasola, Erika Gea Mejías, Miguel Ariza Vega, María Patrocinio Clinical reasoning Fieldwork Placement education Occupational therapy Communication Skills of Trainers Assessment Education The assessment of the acquisition of professional skills is an essential process in occupational therapy students. Until now, there has been no standardized and validated instrument for evaluating these skills in Spanish occupational therapy students. This study reports the development and testing of the psychometric properties of the professional skills in students of occupational therapy during their practical training. Methods: A new instrument was developed to assess the professional skills of occupational therapy students, called CPTO. A total of 69 occupational therapists participated in evaluating 295 occupational therapy students from the University of Granada, between the 2018 and 2021 academic years. Results: Of a total of 79 items, the factor analysis yielded a final solution of 33 items, which explains 70.22% of the variance with the following three dimensions: (1) self-appraisal and professional responsibility (α = 0.951); (2) communication skills and delivering intervention (α = 0.944); and (3) clinical reasoning for assessing and planning the intervention (α = 0.947). The instrument allows students with low, medium, high and excellent clinical skills to be differentiated according to the cutting points established by the quartiles. Conclusion: the instrument has good psychometric properties, and is a useful tool to assess professional competencies in occupational therapy students during their practice placement education. 2021-10-14T12:21:26Z 2021-10-14T12:21:26Z 2021 journal article Romero-Ayuso, D.; Ortiz-Rubio, A.; Moreno-Ramírez, P.; Martín-Martín, L.; Triviño-Juárez, J.M.; Serrano-Guzmán, M.; Cano-Detell, E.; Novoa-Casasola, E.; Gea, M.; Ariza-Vega, P. A New Tool for Assessment of Professional Skills of Occupational Therapy Students. Healthcare 2021, 9, 1243. https:// doi.org/10.3390/healthcare9101243 http://hdl.handle.net/10481/70854 10.3390/healthcare9101243 eng http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/es/ open access Atribución 3.0 España MDPI