AOTA publishes a “Statement of Policy,” which indicates that the association will “maintain and control the voluntary registration of its practitioners; regulate, in conjunction with the Council on Medical Education and Hospitals of the AMA, the education of occupational therapists to prepare them for their treatment function; establish and maintain standards of clinical practice in occupational therapy which will improve patient treatment; foster continuing growth in the professional competence of occupational therapy; encourage and facilitate an increase in the body of specific occupational therapy knowledge available to physicians; protect the standards of occupational therapy and the environment in which the occupational therapist functions; and strongly oppose and protest any administrative policy or structure which ignores or weakens the treatment function of occupational therapy.”