A few days ago, I blogged about the new graduating competencies that will begin to be used in Australia and New Zealand in the the next few years (click here to read this post.) To me, they represent the kind of radical (critical) thinking that is so desperately needed in the physiotherapy profession. As I mentioned in the blogpost, the new competencies are drawn - almost verbatim - from the CanMED system which has been operating in Canada since 2000. The CanMED system was based on public consultations that took place as far back as the 1980s in Ontario (see Nuefeld et al, 1998) which pointed to the fact that 'scientific knowledge has brought large benefits to patients in clinical … [Read more...] about Physiotherapy needs more than just a radical curriculum
Radical new graduating competencies for physiotherapists
It was a reasonably modest event at WCPT (but then what isn't compared to the scale of the congress!), and so you'd be forgiven for missing it, but the formal launch of the new Threshold Standards for physiotherapists in Australia and New Zealand could actually be one of the most significant events to have happened in physiotherapy in recent years (to view the standards, click this link: Threshold standards Australia NZ 2015). For the uninitiated, the standards are the culmination of an enormous trans-Tasman project to align the graduating competencies and capabilities of all the schools in Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand. The project was commissioned by the Australian Physiotherapy … [Read more...] about Radical new graduating competencies for physiotherapists
Critical physiotherapy research update
Depression embodied: an ambiguous striving against fading Louise Danielsson and Susanne Rosberg Although depression is associated to physical discomfort, meanings of the body in depression are rarely addressed in clinical research. Drawing on the concept of the lived body, this study explores depression as an embodied phenomenon. Using a hermeneutic phenomenological approach, the analysis of narrative-based interviews with 11 depressed adults discloses a thematic structure of an embodied process of an ambiguous striving against fading. Five subthemes elicit different dimensions of this process, interpreted as disabling or enabling: feeling estranged, feeling confined, feeling … [Read more...] about Critical physiotherapy research update
Evidence-based medicine or micro-fascism?
We can already hear the objections. The term fascism represents an emotionally charged concept in both the political and religious arenas; it is the ugliest expression of life in the 20th century (180). Not my words, but those of Dave Holmes and Stuart Murray in their fabulous paper Deconstructing the evidence-based discourse in health sciences: Truth, power and fascism. The author's argument is that we desperately need to unmask the 'the hidden politics of evidence-based discourse' (181). A recent Australian report on the efficacy of homeopathy (link) has shown that "There was no reliable evidence from research in humans that homeopathy was effective for treating the range of health … [Read more...] about Evidence-based medicine or micro-fascism?
Podcast – Prof Teresa Mangum – The Future of the Academic and Public Humanities
This podcast if the first in a series of lectures on the future of the humanities in public life. The series began on 28 November 2014 with a leture by Professor Teresa Mangum, Director of the Obermann Centre for Advanced Studies at the University of Iowa. Professor Magnum talks about how the humanities are being systematically undermined by discourses that privilege economic efficiency and utilitarian learning. There are a lot of parallels with the way we are seeing the long-valued capabilities of empathy, caring and altruism in education and health care practice being replaced by capitalistic notions of measurable cost and benefit. Abstract: In the United States, the pressures on the … [Read more...] about Podcast – Prof Teresa Mangum – The Future of the Academic and Public Humanities
Check your privilege: Diagnosing cultural agnosia
Without wanting to sound like a pollyanna, I sometimes wonder if I'm not the luckiest man alive. I live in a beautiful country where human and natural disasters can often seem a long way away; I'm well paid for a job I love; I have ready access to fresh food and water; I'm healthy, and can fall back on public services that have reliably educated my children, emptied my rubbish bins, and generally kept the lights on. I live in a democracy where I can vote to bring about a change, I enjoy a free press, long hot summers, and TV channels that show regular baseball. There are billions of people around the world, who would give their right arm to be blessed with only half of these things. Bill … [Read more...] about Check your privilege: Diagnosing cultural agnosia