Thematic Mapping of Occupational Therapy in Older Adults: A Qualitative Systematic Review of Literature Indexed in Scopus (2020–2025)
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Population aging has increased the demand for Occupational Therapy interventions aimed at preserving the autonomy and participation of older adults. The objective of this study was to develop a thematic map of the scientific literature on Occupational Therapy for this population published between 2020 and 2025. A qualitative systematic review was conducted following the PRISMA 2020 statement, with a search in Scopus, filters for publication period, document type, source type, and language, and eligibility criteria defined before screening. The final corpus comprised 541 articles, whose titles, abstracts, and indexed keywords were examined through inductive thematic analysis, complemented by a descriptive analysis of publication year and citation count. Three dimensions were identified: thematic areas, intervention approaches, and population profiles. Studies on frailty and functional decline (31.8%), cognitive health and dementia (24.4%), and post-hospitalization interventions (23.8%) predominate; together they account for nearly 80% of the corpus and reflect a clinical-rehabilitative orientation. Functional rehabilitation is the most frequent approach (48.4%), followed by community-based intervention (28.1%) and digital intervention or tele-rehabilitation (12.4%), whereas the person-centered model is explicitly mentioned in only 4.6% of the articles. Most studies were conducted with community-dwelling older adults, together with clinical groups associated with dementia and frailty. Although community-based and digital interventions show a growing presence, social participation and active aging remain underrepresented, which highlights the need to strengthen person-centered research lines focused on community participation. Because the analysis was restricted to Scopus and to titles, abstracts, and keywords, future reviews should broaden documentary coverage and examine the full texts of the included studies.
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