I've written before about the trend in the UK towards triaging all and treating some patients with musculoskeletal complaints over the telephone. I've been very skeptical of this approach to the problem of access to PT services. By its very definition, we're removing the ''physical'' from physical therapy. A new paper came out last week in ...

Two weeks from today, the APTA's annual conference & exposition will kick off, making its first-ever appearance in the state of Utah. From June 26-29, PT 2013 is scheduled to convene in beautiful Salt Lake City. The exclusive ADVANCE preview article detailing city attractions and conference highlights can be found here. According to Curtis ...

In past posts, I've expressed frustration at volunteering for various opportunities within the APTA and the Neurology Section. A few months ago, I was nominated for a position on the nominating committee for the stroke special interest group. The results arrived today. I wasn't elected. I wasn't surprised. One of the questions nominees were asked ...

Over the past few months I've noticed a few things about the physical therapy profession that caught my attention, and I wanted to describe the situations here.  First, I was speaking with a physical therapist about the doctorate program education for physical therapists, and she responded, ''I think it's a really good thing that they are ...

It was recently brought to my attention that in certain states, the option exists to take the National Physical Therapy Exam (NPTE) prior to graduation if certain requirements have been met. Eligibility varies from state to state -- some require completion of the didactic portion of the program, others set a maximum amount of time prior to ...

When I was at the horse show last weekend, I learned one of the show kid mothers is a PT. I learned this because she was treating another of the mothers using cranio-sacral therapy. I'm not sure what pushed more of my buttons, her treating someone on the fly or using cranio-sacral to do so. This isn't the first time I've said I don't think PTs ...

My newest thought project for this week is to better understand how physical therapist staffing is predicted for a new clinic. How does a new healthcare company or private practice facility estimate what kind of staffing it will need in a new location? My general understanding of private practice is that due to limited funds, staffing will start ...

I learned this expression while working in England. It was a way of getting to the core of something, often a product, to determine the original intent and whether it was accomplished. I wonder that about continuing education requirements. Florida has had them (12 hours/year) since I've been practicing (a long time) while New York has only ...

So I'm back in the US about six months now and I've got a massive amount of continuing education to do. Before anyone starts wagging fingers about ''serves you right'' or anything else that sounds like your mother scolding, I had to do lots of CPD (continuous professional development) in the UK... none of it counts here. The UK accepts everything ...

This weekend I taught a continuing education course with three other therapists. It took well over a year for us to organize the content, create the handouts and visual displays and market the course to get as many participants as possible. It was a fun process to figure out the best way to engage the participants and relay the most important ...