BACKGROUND Health knowledge develops fast and includes a lot of ambiguous or tentative information. In their daily routine, both health care students and professionals continuously have to make judgments about the viability of health knowledge. People's epistemological beliefs (EBs) and their therapeutic health concepts are factors that influence how they deal with health knowledge. However, ve...

OBJECTIVES To explore the preparedness of final-year physiotherapy students for their progression into employment, and identify what universities can do to facilitate a smooth transition. DESIGN A single-cohort study, utilising a qualitative design incorporating a survey followed by transcribed and coded semi-structured interviews. SETTING Interviews were held in the Placement and Careers C...

Background Upon graduation, physiotherapists are required to manage clinical caseloads involving deteriorating patients with complex conditions. In particular, emergency on-call physiotherapists are required to provide respiratory/cardio-respiratory/cardiothoracic physiotherapy, out of normal working hours, without senior physiotherapist support. To optimise patient safety, physiotherapists are...

BACKGROUND Rural areas in all countries suffer from a shortage of health care professionals. In South Africa, the shortage is particularly marked; some rural areas have a doctor-to-population ratio of 5.5:100 000. Similar patterns apply to other health professionals. Increasing the proportion of rural-origin students in faculties of health sciences has been shown to be one way of addressing suc...

This paper introduces a paper and pencil-based method for capturing naturally occurring interactions in ethnographic fieldwork notes where no electronic (audio / video) recording equipment can be used. The method was developed for a study exploring the practical accomplishment of hospitalbased physiotherapy education. Physiotherapy is a movement and touchbased healthcare profession where studen...

This study aimed to evaluate the educational environment of the health sciences programs of KLE University, Belgaum, Karnataka, India, to identify their strengths and weaknesses, and to suggest strategies to improve the educational environment to be on par with global standards. A cross-sectional study was conducted using the Dundee Ready Educational Environment Measure (DREEM) questionnaire, f...

Purpose of Study: Physiotherapy plays a major role in rehabilitating a patient. The role of a Physiotherapist is to deal with application of physiotherapy skills & knowledge to the assessment, design, delivery & evaluation of physiotherapeutic treatments in the management of the various conditions of acute or chronic sickness, disability or handicap. The history of physiotherapy, in India, was ...

BACKGROUND Despite the recent widespread adoption of simulation in clinical education in physiotherapy, there is a lack of validated tools for assessment in this setting. The Assessment of Physiotherapy Practice (APP) is a comprehensive tool used in clinical placement settings in Australia to measure professional competence of physiotherapy students. The aim of the study was to evaluate the val...