Building an educational App to support physiotherapy practice in acute care

Alves Lopes, António

http://hdl.handle.net/10400.26/44464

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Authors

Alves Lopes, António

Abstract(s)

Introduction: To meet the increasing demand, physiotherapists should have the competencies to intervene in all conditions and contexts throughout the life cycle of their clients/patients. Educating and supporting physiotherapy students in the knowledge and skills required to operate in an acute care setting both expands and improves their entry-level capabilities as well as preparing them to work with patients. To facilitate easy access to updated information related to Acute care Settings (health and professional guidelines, media resources) we decided to develop and implement a Mobile App available to all physiotherapy professionals and students. Methodology: The app was developed in the curricular year of 2020-2021, as a student project, included in the International Minor in Physiotherapy in Acute Care organized in partnership with Alcoitão School of Health Sciences, Portugal and the Hanze University of Applied Sciences, Groningen, the Netherlands. After the initial needs assessment related to the future App contents and features, the students were divided into different working groups to develop the different sections of the App. The content was developed using international guidelines and research related to physiotherapist practice in Acute Care. The mobile app was implemented using a free online tool (glideapps.com) and divided into 3 main sections: Patient Assessment, evidence resources and tools. Results: At the end of the Minor edition, students answered an anonymous online questionnaire on the development of this tool. The data revealed a very favourable opinion regarding pedagogical approaches used and consider activities like App development had contributed to the overall objectives of the Minor (90% agree / totally agree). Conclusions: Based on the positive input from the students, we consider the implementation to have been successful. The next steps are, to update the content and resources based on the evidence available and allow the App to be freely available to the Physiotherapy educational and professional context. After this experience, we will try to disseminate the use of mobile apps in education.