Importance of Anatomy Education on Electrotherapy Lectures in Physiotherapy and Rehabilitation Curricula: Student Perceptions of a Foundation University

Abstract

Student opinions are important to improve the physiotherapy and rehabilitation curriculum, and to maintain the quality of education. This study aimed to evaluate the students' perception levels related to anatomy education in terms of electrotherapy lectures. Third and fourth-year physiotherapy students (61 female, 43 male) have voluntarily participated in this study. The data were obtained by a survey, which consists of 29 closed-ended (15 Likert-type questions) questions. The average age was 21.82 ± 1.62 years. The grade point average of the participants, which is based on the 4-point scale, is 2.33 ± 0.44 points. There was no difference between the genders in terms of the grade point averages (p = 0.78). Students stated that the anatomy knowledge of the musculoskeletal system is extremely important in terms of electrotherapy lectures. This is followed by the nervous system and the circulatory system, respectively. They also stated that they need more anatomy knowledge during motor point stimulation applications (50%), and less anatomy knowledge during ultrasound applications (15.38%). In the results of Likert-type survey, first and second highest scores were pertained to "I need anatomy knowledge when inserting electrodes" and "The knowledge which is obtained from anatomy lectures affect to the motor nerve stimulations" (1.42 ± 0.67 and 1.40 ± 0.66, respectively, p < 0.05) and the least score was pertained to "I need to look at my anatomy notes before the electrotherapy exams" (0.41 ± 0.88, p < 0.05). The results from this study help to enhance our conceptual understanding of students' perception levels of anatomy education importance in terms of electrotherapy lectures.

A Comparative Analysis of Physical Therapy Anatomical Knowledge and Retention: Human Donor Dissection Versus Virtual Laboratory

“…Although multiple anatomy studies have compared the effectiveness of different anatomical instructional methods for short-term anatomy knowledge, [9][10][11]14,[24][25][26][27] far fewer have examined longterm anatomical knowledge retention, 13,66 and application to future coursework. 14,54,55 In this study, PT student long-term anatomical knowledge application was indirectly measured via kinesiology and foundational musculoskeletal course performance. Both kinesiology 54 and foundational musculoskeletal 67 content require students to apply anatomical knowledge.…”

“…at research gap exists because PT researchers often compare instructional methods by examining student knowledge immediately after anatomy courses. [10][11][12]14,53 However, fewer studies 14,24,[54][55][56] have examined how anatomy affects PT student future academic performance in other coursework and none of those long-term studies have compared software to HDD. For example, anatomy knowledge seems to be important for student performance in kinesiology, 14,54 musculoskeletal coursework, 14 electrotherapy, 55 and National PT Examination (NPTE) success.…”

“…[10][11][12]14,53 However, fewer studies 14,24,[54][55][56] have examined how anatomy affects PT student future academic performance in other coursework and none of those long-term studies have compared software to HDD. For example, anatomy knowledge seems to be important for student performance in kinesiology, 14,54 musculoskeletal coursework, 14 electrotherapy, 55 and National PT Examination (NPTE) success. 56 However, to make laboratory format recommendations, educators need comparative research.…”

A core musculoskeletal anatomy syllabus for undergraduate physical therapy student education

“…Anatomy has long been considered a fundamental component of physical therapy curricula (Milacek & Pedersen, 1967; Turhan & Kocamaz, 2021) but, unlike the medical education field, there have been limited attempts to define the required anatomical knowledge for physical therapy students. In medical education, support for the development of a core anatomy syllabus is seen as a response to the reduction in anatomy teaching hours over recent decades, associated with expanding curriculum demands in other disciplines (Bergman et al, 2014).…”

“…Physical therapy is focused on optimizing movement and function (American Physical Therapy Association, 2015; WCPT, 2019) and while a number of concepts have been suggested to be associated with the movement system (Carroll et al, 2022), musculoskeletal anatomy is one of the underlying foundational sciences. Furthermore, musculoskeletal anatomy knowledge has been reported by undergraduate physical therapy students to be critical in particular aspects of clinical practice (Turhan & Kocamaz, 2021). This is especially important in the physical therapy profession given that graduates are typically able to work autonomously in primary care practice directly after graduation (WCPT, 2021) following accreditation of the program by local bodies (McMeeken, 2007).…”