By Dr. Cynthia Vaccarino
What do many athletes, kids, and adults have in common? One thing is that many will likely suffer from an injury as the result of an accident, competition, or physically overdoing daily activities. The remedy for instances like these vary from ice and an anti-inflammatory to surgery.
The next step is recovery.
Physical therapy can often be the solution so that you can regain movement. A physical therapist evaluates your movement system. This is deceptively simple, because that evaluation includes assessing your cardiovascular, pulmonary, endocrine and nervous systems, in addition to your bones, muscles and skin. Treatment of patients is customized because no two injuries are alike and the physical therapist wants to achieve the best possible results for their patients.
The ages of patients range from the very young to the young at heart.
Starting with infants and children, they may need assistance developing their motor skills, which can range from improving play, eating and sleeping. For the young at heart, a physical therapist, or physical therapist assistant, can help them maintain their health and independence. As we know, one of the major risks for seniors is falling. Physical therapy can help them improve their bone and cardiovascular health, along with flexibility and muscle tone. This helps reduce the risk of falling and the injuries that may come with it.
Physical therapists work in a variety of settings, from hospitals and assisted living communities to their own practices. They have earned clinical doctorate degrees and focus on medical or health conditions that restrict movement and functions.
At Hodges University, we offer a two-year PTA degree program that includes class, lab and clinical work. The Commission on Accreditation in Physical Therapy Education (CAPTE) accredits our program, which is the gold standard in the industry. It is the only accreditation agency that is recognized by both the US Department of Education and the Council for Higher Education Accreditation. In the US, there are only 371 PTA programs that have earned this accreditation.
As the population ages and more people realize the benefits of living active lives, the demand for physical therapists will continue to grow. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, demand for physical therapist assistants is expected to grow 30 percent by the year 2026.
Our students dedicate themselves to mastering the knowledge and skills needed to be excellent physical therapist assistants when they graduate. When the pandemic hit last year, we were the first university to bring students back to campus, and they were our PTA students. In order to graduate, they must have a certain number of hands-on lab hours and in the field experience. We took all precautions and safely worked with them to complete their lab work and clinicals so they could graduate as scheduled at the end of the year.
We just celebrated the graduation of that class in December 2020. After graduation, our students are qualified to take the licensing exam, and it’s a point of pride to say that all the members of the December 2020 class that took the exam passed it the first time!
They are now out in the community to make a positive impact in the quality of their patient’s lives.
Dr. Cynthia Vaccarino, PT, DPT, is the Director of the Physical Therapy Assistant program at Hodges University.
Modern Labs
Hodges University’s modern Health Science Building includes state of the art labs and a classroom for PTA.
• Treatment tables
• PT bands and parallel bars
• Exercise equipment and modality machines
• Kitchen to teach patients how to manage skills at home
Hodges University
239-482-0019
pathways.hodges.edu