Physiotherapy management of functional movement disorders: the patient perspective

Figures & data

Table 1. Primary questions from the semi-structured interview guide.

Topic	Suggested questions and prompts
Participants account	Please can you tell me about your FMD symptoms, from when they started and how they are now? Were you given any information about FMD, had you heard of it before you were diagnosed with it?
Experiences of physiotherapy	Please describe the physiotherapy treatment that you have received. When, how often, for how long? Inpatients/outpatients? Was there anything that you found helpful/not helpful?
Expectations of treatment	Did you have any expectations of the physiotherapy treatment? Is there anything you would liked to have done differently in physiotherapy? Is there anything you feel that will help you get better or improve?
Recovery	What does recovery from FMD look like to you? Have you ever had any periods of time without your symptoms? What happened, how did this feel? (Like you had recovered or did you expect the symptoms to come back) Do you think your symptoms will go away?
Any other comments	Is there anything else you would like to mention about your experiences of FMD or physiotherapy?

Table 2. Description of the stages of interpretive phenomenological analysis.

Stage	Interpretative phenomenological analysis description
1	Data Preparation (transcription)
2	Reading and familiarisation, taking note of items of interest.
3	Coding – complete coding of one data item - providing a brief commentary on the data occurring at 3 main levels; 1. Descriptive comments, 2. Linguistic comments, 3. Conceptual comments
4	Developing emergent themes of that data item
5	Searching for connections across emergent themes and generating superordinate themes across the one data item Producing a table/figure to represent the analysis
6	Repeat stages 3-5 with all other data sets
7	Identifying themes and superordinate themes across the datasets. Producing a table/figure to represent the complete analysis
8	Writing up and finalising the analysis

Table 3. Demographic and clinical data of participants.

Participant pseudonym	Age	Gender	Duration of symptoms	Symptom onset to diagnosis	Symptoms	Type of treatment received
Adam	67	M	42 months	33 months	Weakness, seizures, tremor, loss of dexterity, loss of balance and falls	Specialist MDT programme (as outpatient), community physiotherapy
Billy	31	M	23 months	5 months	Spasms, shaking, pain, global dystonia	Outpatient physiotherapy, generic group exercise
Claire	31	F	Since toddler	27 years	Dystonia, paralysis, brain fog, pain, fatigue, sensory disturbance	Pain clinic, exercise on referral (group), outpatient physiotherapy, sports injury clinic, psychology
Delia	35	F	19 months	4 months	Shuffling gait, altered sensation, speech changes, brain fog	Neurological physiotherapy, community physiotherapy with some experience of FMD, physiotherapist led group exercise
Edwina	57	F	136 months	77 months	Muscle twitching, gait disturbance, sensory disturbance, pain, weakness	Inpatient general ward physiotherapy, community physiotherapy, specialist MDT programme (as inpatient)
Fatima	55	F	Since toddler	45 years	Dystonia, freezing, memory loss, word finding difficulties, dissociation	Community physiotherapy, private massage, acupuncture
Gemma	24	F	9 months	2 days	Paralysis, weakness, spasms reduced balance, numbness	Inpatient generic ward physiotherapy, community neurological physiotherapy