Introduction: The use of Physical Agents (PA) in the practice of physical therapy (PT) specialty requires clinical reasoning and knowing their risks and contraindications; however, sometimes deficiencies are observed when used in clinical practice.
Objective: To implement the Objective Structured Clinical Evaluation (OSCE) methodology for the assessment of clinical skills in physical therapy specialty students when using PA.
Materials and methods: A pilot non-experimental cross-sectional study was conducted in 114 physical therapy students enrolled during the first semester of 2019 in a PA course offered at the Universidad Andres Bello, Santiago, Chile. The OSCE consisted of seven peer-validated stations in which various skills were implemented in simulated clinical scenarios to achieve learning outcomes associated with the use of PA, namely: S1: Connective tissue flexibility; S2:Muscle relaxation; S3:Analgesia; S4:Drainage; S5:Strengthening; S6:Parameters interpretation, and S7:Equipment installation. Observers at each station assessed students’ clinical skills and decision-making using a checklist. OSCE scores were described using medians and interquartile ranges, representing the data dispersion between the 25th and 75th percentile (P25-P75). Stations scores by gender were compared using the Mann-Whitney U test.
Results: Median scores were higher than the minimum passing score in stations S1 (66, IQR: 52-70), S2 (55, IQR: 45-60), S3 (60, IQR: 50-69), S4 (65, IQR: 55-73), and S7 (40, IQR: 33-45), but they were below the passing score in stations S5 (54, IQR:46-65) and S6 (10, IQR: 9-13). In addition, 101 (88.59%) students had a global passing score in the OSCE.
Conclusion: The OSCE scores obtained by the participants show their attainment of clinical skills when using PA, since most of them obtained a global passing score; however, reinforcing the parameters interpretation clinical skills is necessary, since the lowest mean score was obtained in said station.