Physiotherapy students’ self-reported assessment of professional behaviours and skills while working with young people with disability

Abstract

Purpose: To quantify self-reported changes in student professional behaviours and skills after a 10-week community-based experience. Method: Twenty-eight physiotherapy students (22 women, 6 men; mean age 21.9 years, SD 2.9) were each matched with a young person with Down syndrome, who was randomly allocated to an intervention or control group. The intervention group completed a 10-week, twice a week progressive resistance training (PRT) programme. The control group completed a 10-week, once a week social programme. Before and after the experience, the students completed a self-reported assessment of their skills in prescribing and supervising PRT, professional behaviours, confidence and the likelihood they would work with people with intellectual disability in the future. Between-group differences were analysed using analysis of covariance with baseline measures as covariate. Results: There were between-group differences for 7 items rating skills implementing PRT, in favour of the intervention group, but not for any other outcome. Across both groups, students self-reported positive changes in their professional behaviours, confidence and the likelihood they would work with people with intellectual disability after the programme. Conclusions: A 10-week community-based experience produced changes in physiotherapy student professional behaviours. Students who completed the exercise programme self-reported an improvement in their professional skills relating to PRT.

Implications for Rehabilitation

• Community-based experiences working with young people with disability offer physiotherapy students the opportunity to development their professional behaviours, skills and confidence.

• Students who completed a 10-week experience working with a young person with Down syndrome reported they were more likely to work with people with intellectual disability in the future.

• Improvements in the students’ skills in delivering progressive resistance training were only found for the students who completed an experience that included an exercise intervention.

• Exercise
• experiential learning
• learning outcomes
• physiotherapy
• student mentors

Acknowledgements

Ms. Elin Wee is acknowledged for her contribution to the data collection. The authors would also like to acknowledge the contributions of all the participants.