The Relationship of Work Experience to Clinical Performance

Research has documented the impact of experience on learning. However, there are no studies within the physical therapy (PT) literature that address the specific relationship between work experience and clinical performance. Hence, the purpose of my research was to explore this relationship. The study, involving 155 students who completed a MPT program between 2003 and 2006, examined differences in the clinical performance of two groups: nontraditional (NONTRAD)students who had worked as PT assistants before entering the MPT program, and traditional (TRAD) students who had not. Clinical instructors recorded midterm and final evaluations of 24 professional skills. For most of the skills, the two groups did not differ significantly in degrees of change from midterm to final scores. However, final evaluations showed that the NONTRAD students scored higher than the TRAD students. The qualitative data supported the quantitative findings. That is, clinical instructors consistently indicated that the NONTRAD students demonstrated better clinical performance than did the TRAD students.