The diagnostic process and indication for physiotherapy: a prerequisite for treatment and outcome evaluation

Abstract

The need for the profession of physiotherapy to illustrate its value to the external world is becoming more obvious each year. Those who pay for physiotherapy services would like to limit the number of sessions and the length of the treatment episode of physiotherapy care. It is therefore incumbent on the profession to design a conceptual framework for the physiotherapy process that can be used to study the efficacy, effectiveness and efficiency of physiotherapy by employing appropriate clinical research techniques. The result of this research can contribute to the development of treatment guidelines to produce optimal patient outcomes.

The purpose'of this paper is twofold: (1) to provide insight into the similarities and differences between medical and physiotherapy diagnoses; and (2) to provide a basis by which the physiotherapist's diagnosis helps to determine the indication for physiotherapy, the strategy of physiotherapeutic care, and the outcome prognosis.

A systematic multilevel system approach to the process of physiotherapy practice is a prerequisite for the improvement of the quality of patient care, and the design of meaningful randomized clinical trials.