UW Doctor of Physical Therapy

The Doctor of Physical Therapy program at the University of Washington offers an exceptional, well-rounded education for students who want to graduate as physical therapy generalists. At the UW, you’ll study in one of the top departments for rehabilitation services in the United States. Learn more at https://www.physicaltherapy.uw.edu/.

Video Transcript:

[Sally]
There are many different settings and situations that physical therapists can work in. We have to prepare students to be available to do any of those things.

[Patti]
We try to make our courses very interactive. We have a lot of expert speakers come in from the community to talk about different topics. There's a lot of lab work, going into the lab, especially for anatomy and neuroanatomy, and getting familiar with the structures that you will be working on. There's also lab work where you're actually working on each other.

[Kathryn]
There's a lot of skill based classes where you're working with other students. There's also patients that come in with actual injuries where you get to, you know diagnose that. So you're supplementing that as you're building on those academic knowledge prior to going out into the internships.

[Sally]
We recently revamped and built a brand new research lab. Having the new research space allows us to take the DPT students into this lab and demonstrate how all the technology works, in terms of measuring, three-dimensional movement, kinematics, kinetics, and those kinds of things.

[Patti]
The big thing now with students who are coming in is they're really looking for ways to give back to the community, to be involved to make a difference.

[Sally]
There are programs that we continually interface with, some through the school of medicine, some just through community organizations, and the Physical Therapy Association of Washington. As well, our students have established relationships with three different places in the world. One in Zimbabwe, one in Peru, one in Guatemala, and students take trips to these three locations each year, and in those settings, they're working, they go with a clinical instructor, a licensed physical therapist and learn an incredible amount.

At the University of Washington, in the department of Rehabilitation Medicine we have three different programs for health professionals, a Master's of Prosthetics and Orthotics, a Master's of Occupational Therapy, and then we have our Doctor of Physical Therapy program. We have foundation courses that all programs require. So, for those foundation courses the students are in class together, and taught all at once.

[Kathryn]
Having the interdisciplinary piece of it I think better prepares us as professionals to work in real settings, because, we're very often not isolated in the work we're doing. It's really important, even for people that are in just a physical therapy environment, if it's an outpatient clinic, to make those connections, and connect patients to who they need to be in touch with.

[Sally]
I hope most that the students are ready to be responsible for their own education and continuing education and that they see that as a priority to provide the best service they can to the people that they provide services to.

[Kathryn]
In this profession, there's always going to be growth, there's always going to be more to learn. You don't go out and know it all and show up on that first day, and know exactly what you're doing. But you feel like you can do that, and I think the program helps build that confidence to say I can get there. I will continue to get there.

[Patti]
We hope that when they go out into the community to become practitioners and clinicians in their own right, or even when they go out into the clinics where they're doing their internships that they can share that same enthusiasm and passion and hopefully they will be inspiring the next generation too, to come and to be a health care professional and go back and serve.