Physiotherapy is a field of medical health sciences that deals with the restoration of movement after a traumatic injury or genetic disorder or any other neurological deficit. The professionals who complete a degree of 4.5 years followed by an internship at a recognized hospital get a licence to practise physiotherapy in India. Physiotherapists use a holistic approach for the treatment and their type of treatment completely depends upon the kind of disease. Physiotherapy is a wide field consisting of manual therapy, electrotherapy, soft tissue manipulation, PNF techniques, exercise therapy and many others. The quality of a physiotherapist lies in her/his hands to manipulate joint and restore normal functions.
Many students aspire to be physiotherapists or there can be people around who don’t know what skills their physiotherapists should have. Here are some of the skills that make a good therapist:
- A THERAPIST SHOULD BE ACTIVE AND FIT
To treat a patient and to work on his motor skills require the full energy of a therapist. One has to rehabilitate the patient which includes balancing exercises, equilibrium exercises, theraband or resistance exercises or manual techniques. The therapist has to do the work in a way so that he doesn’t hurt himself or the pain doesn’t transfer because of the poor techniques. Therefore, a physiotherapist should be active and fit.
- A THERAPIST SHOULD OBSERVE
One of the most important parts of the patient’s assessment is to observe the patient. Observation includes many things such as his walking pattern, posture, limping, usage of walking aids or any other. Even when the patient is 100% of the story, still, when a therapist has a keen eye, only then he can diagnose the disease correctly.
- MEASTRO OF BIOMECHANICS
It is the most obvious part as physical therapy requires knowledge. Everyone studies and completes their degree but not everyone becomes a good therapist. A good therapist should have complete knowledge of some of the important subjects: anatomy, physiology, biomechanics and neurology. One can observe but without having proper knowledge, he can’t diagnose it. The most important part is Biomechanics and one should have a good amount of knowledge about movements and how they work.
- A THERAPIST SHOULD THINK OUT OF THE BOX
There are numerous techniques that one can implement on their patients. Thousands of textbooks have thousands of manual approaches. But, a good therapist understands that each patient is a unique case and for that, one will have to use a different approach. Sometimes, therapists have to think out-of-the-box to treat the patients.
- GOOD LISTENER
A therapist should be compassionate towards listening to the patient even if he knows the problem is just psychosomatic. He should be able to handle that part through manual therapy and reassurance. This is what is lacking in most of the average physiotherapists as it’s not only mechanical work. A good physiotherapist works on the whole body as well as on the mind.
- HOLISTIC APPROACH
One should keep in mind understanding the patient’s diet lifestyle psychology and personality so that he can use his holistic tools of other alternative therapies of Osteopathy. Osteopathy refers to relax the nerves through the brain and the viscera of acupuncture balancing the meridians. One should be very good in biomechanics analysis of musculoskeletal deviations
- BE A TEAM MEMBER
For complicated cases, a therapist should be graceful enough to refer to a specialist’s work and to work as a team with other medical professionals such as Orthopaedics, Neurologists, Psychotherapist and Dentists. One should always discuss the case with the concerned doctor who has referred for physiotherapy treatment. Both are important, to work as a team and also to be confident enough to suggest deleting the clinic and use evidence research-based approach. Because some orthopaedics believe in conventional physiotherapy, conventional tens, diathermy and ultrasound. Even though SWD (short wave diathermy) is ban in the US as they have no placebo effect and has side effects.
- USE OF COMBINATION THERAPY
Some physiotherapist keeps giving ultrasound endlessly to a patient at a painful point. This is not the right approach. Ultrasound should be avoided and it shouldn’t be used for more than 10 sessions at one site. One cannot work symptomatically at the painful site. Suppose it’s a frozen shoulder and the pain is at the deltoid insertion. In this case, ultrasound is never going to work. Sometimes a migraine can be because of tight fascia in the stomach or gastric issues so a physiotherapist or osteopath should work on the abdomen fascia to relieve the patient from migraine or sciatica.
All these factors are important in becoming a good physiotherapist and therefore, one should understand all the points.
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