Twogood Rory, Hares Elly, Wyatt Matthew, Cuff Andrew
Connect Health Ltd, NHS Musculoskeletal Services, Newcastle upon Tyne, Tyne and Wear, UK.
Connect Health Ltd, NHS Musculoskeletal Services, Newcastle upon Tyne, Tyne and Wear, UK
BMJ Open Qual. 2020 Nov;9(4). doi: 10.1136/bmjoq-2020-001107.
Practice-based learning via clinical placement is a core part of a physiotherapy degree with the Chartered Society of Physiotherapy requiring completion of 1000 placement hours over a preregistration degree programme. In April 2020, as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent lockdown Connect Health had to cancel 10 student placements as we transitioned to virtual consultations for all clinics. This cancellation of student placements was replicated across the nation with many Higher Education Institutes reporting a backlog of student placements. Without the requisite placement hours students are unable to progress into the next academic year or are unable to graduate. This then reduces the flow of new-graduate physiotherapists into the workforce at a time when there is a plan to grow the physiotherapy workforce to meet primary care demand. In response to this problem a novel placement model to facilitate virtual student placements ('virtual placements') was developed, tested and then rolled out across Connect Health using the Plan-Do-Study-Act quality improvement methodology. The model combines shadowing a broad range of virtual clinics with delivery of patient-facing online exercise classes via the Facebook Live platform and completion of virtual projects to support knowledge consolidation. This virtual student placement model enabled an increase in student capacity of over 400% compared with 2018-2019 with 182 students starting between May and August 2020. The model runs using widely available technology, requires no additional investment and has enabled these students to continue their studies and progress towards qualifying as physiotherapists.
通过临床实习进行基于实践的学习是物理治疗学位课程的核心部分，英国特许物理治疗师协会要求在预注册学位课程中完成1000小时的实习。2020年4月，由于新冠疫情及随后的封锁措施，Connect Health不得不取消10个学生实习安排，因为我们所有诊所都转向了虚拟咨询。全国各地都出现了学生实习安排被取消的情况，许多高等教育机构都报告有学生实习积压。没有必要的实习时长，学生就无法进入下一学年或无法毕业。这就减少了新毕业物理治疗师进入劳动力市场的数量，而此时正计划增加物理治疗师劳动力以满足初级保健需求。为应对这一问题，我们开发、测试并在Connect Health全面推行了一种新型实习模式，以促进虚拟学生实习（“虚拟实习”），采用的是计划-执行-研究-行动质量改进方法。该模式将观摩各类虚拟诊所与通过Facebook Live平台提供面向患者的在线健身课程以及完成虚拟项目以支持知识巩固相结合。与2018 - 2019年相比，这种虚拟学生实习模式使学生容纳量增加了400%以上，2020年5月至8月有182名学生开始实习。该模式使用广泛可用的技术运行，无需额外投资，使这些学生能够继续学业并朝着成为物理治疗师的方向迈进。
