Patient reported outcomes from a student-led physical therapy clinic in two medically underserved areas.

Abstract

Background: Student-led physical therapy (PT) clinics are a standard component of many entry-level PT curricula; however, reports on the operating procedures and patient outcomes of these clinics are limited. Therefore, our aim is to provide a descriptive report of a student-led, faculty-supervised PT clinic and to report available patient reported functional outcomes.

Methods: The clinic maintains a database of de-identified patient information for quality assurance and improvement purposes. The following data from a period of one academic year were retrospectively analyzed from this database: demographic information, referring diagnosis, visit frequency, and score on the Patient Specific Functional Scale (PSFS), a patient-reported functional measure. Descriptive statistics were used to aggregate demographic and visit information, and a Wilcoxon-signed rank test was used to compare the first recorded PSFS score to the last recorded PSFS score of patients who attended multiple visits.

Results: Five hundred eight patients were treated for a total of 1000 visits. Thirty-eight percent of patients returned for at least one follow-up visit. Statistically significant improvements in PSFS scores (+1.49,Z = -6.934, p < .001, 95% CI [1.00,1.75]) were achieved in patients who attended multiple visits, with 33% improving by the minimally clinically important difference for their condition.

Conclusion: In addition to student learning opportunities, student-led PT clinics can result in statistically significant and clinically important improvements in patient-reported function for those who attend more than one visit.