DPT Portfolios

Professional Goal Statement

My desire in this profession is to play a service role to those in the clinic and my community. I want to be able to provide the education and tools necessary for any individual to overcome their ailment and continue doing the things they love. In order to do so, I must also dedicate myself to continuous learning and continuous adaptation, as the science behind physical therapy changes over the years to come. As stated before, playing a service role does not end with patients for me. I desire to be present in the community providing care where it is needed. I also want to be involved in the development of future physical therapists, through being a clinical instructor and, one day, a faculty member within a DPT program. This end goal of being a clinician and a course instructor will take time to achieve, so until then I plan on pursuing a career in outpatient orthopedics, hopefully in a setting in which I can continue gaining experience in treating the general population.

 

Career Plans

Previous Clinical Experiences:

• UNC Spine Center – Chapel Hill, NC
  • Outpatient Orthopedic
  • 8-week rotation (Summer, 2021)
• UNC Caldwell / Quest4Life – Lenoir, NC
  • General Outpatient/Neuromuscular Rehab
  • 8-week rotation (Spring, 2022)
• UNC Hospitals, Hillsborough campus – Hillsborough, NC
  • Acute Care
  • 8-week rotation (Summer, 2022)
• Bull City PT – Durham, NC
  • Outpatient Orthopedic/Sport Rehab
  • 12-week rotation (May 1st – July 21^st, 2023)

Future Plans:

• Obtain licensure in North Carolina by passing the NPTE (July 2023)
• Graduate as a Doctor of Physical Therapy from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (July 2023)
• Complete planned job interviews following graduation and hopefully accept a job offer (August 2023)
  • In search of a best-fit job that I can see myself spending multiple years at
  • Setting of current interest: outpatient orthopedics for general population within a hospital setting
• Complete certification for strength and conditioning specialist (CSCS) by the end of the year (2023)
• Become Dry Needling certified within the first half of next year (2024)
• Begin part-time job of working with strength athletes virtually and in-person to provide comprehensive rehabilitation along side their training (2024)
• Search for collaboration with local high schools for strength training and rehabilitation (2024)
• Become a clinical instructor as soon as possible (~2025)
• Consider attending orthopedic residency or sitting for OCS exam (2026-2027)

 

Self-Assessment

Strengths:

• Seeking, receiving, and applying feedback
• Work ethic
• Providing patient-centered care
• Differential diagnosis
• Patient education and communication
• Professional development
• Leadership
  • Teaching assistant for MSK 1 (2023)
  • Head supervisor of facility operations staff – UNC Campus Recreation Mid-Campus (2018-2020)

Areas for Further Development:

• Clinical reasoning
• Involvement in local advocacy for the profession
• Confidence in clinical skills

 

Objectives

• Complete the NPTE (July 26th, 2023)
• Graduate from UNC – Chapel Hill as a Doctor of Physical Therapy (July 29th, 2023)
• Completed in-person interviews for positions of interest (July 31st and August 1st, 2023)
• Complete licensure after receiving passing NPTE score (TBD)
• Begin working as a full-time PT (mig-August, 2023)
• Complete CSCS course of study and complete certification exam (October-December, 2023)
• Obtain Dry Needling certification during first half of next year (January-May, 2024)
• Attend orthopedic residency or sit for OCS exam (2026-2027)

Strategies

• Prepare adequately for the NPTE through Score Builders resources, practice exams, and resourceful podcasts
• Prepare adequately for in-person interviews through further researching information about the positions, the company, and the current staff
• Search for continuing education credits in preparation for CSCS and purchase 2023 exam study guide
• Search for continuing education courses for dry needling
• Purchase Current Concepts in preparation for OCS

 

Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion

During my first semester as a student in this program, I drew a lot of insight from a course on the psychosocial aspects of disability and illness. During the first weeks of this course, we delved into implicit biases and inequities within healthcare. As a class, we read a book titled “Blindspot: Hidden biases in Good People”. Reading through this book caused me to reflect on my own biases that I may have due to many factors, from the environment I was raised in, to the circulating news throughout different levels of media. Recognizing these biases is important but what I primarily learned from is how to deal with them. Through reading this book and having multiple conversations with classmates, it became clear that often everyone comes to the table with some form of bias. Whether it be from a traumatic experience or from the people you were raised around, everyone’s “Blindspot” tends to hold on to these thoughts and assumptions. It is each of our personal responsibility to recognize these biases and not allow them to dictate the way we treat or communicate with others.

This topic is incredibly important to this program and any healthcare field, as we spend our time serving those from different backgrounds and different belief systems. Are we going to allow our implicit biases to dictate how we serve those who come into our clinics? Or will we actively work against them in order for us to care for them in the most appropriate and effective way possible? Many healthcare inequities exist in our healthcare system today, potentially due in part to the implicit biases held by those who hold positions in patient care. If we do not actively recognize these ideas and assumptions that exist in our subconscious thought, then we will never be able to move past them to provide the best care possible to all individuals.

 

Products

For my Capstone Project, I engaged in a new topic for the Musculoskeletal I course by creating and presenting a lecture on low back versus hip differentiation for first-year DPT students. I was able to provide this presentation, take the students through a lab period to practice various hip-related special tests, and provide opportunity for clinical application through patient cases.

Capstone Project

During my third year, I completed a clinically appraised topic (CAT) for Evidence-Based Practice II. I conducted my search and appraisal on the efficacy of improving Neck Disability Index (NDI) scores for patients with chronic or acute neck pain through thoracic manipulation versus thoracic manipulation in addition to therapeutic exercise.

Critically Appraised Topic

 

Reflective Statement

After almost three years spent in this program, I can gratefully say I have almost completed my way across the bridge that is PT school. The only things that lie ahead are finishing my final clinical rotation and passing the NPTE. Crossing this bridge, to me, has not simply been completing the course work and clinical hours. More so, it has been observing myself grow in confidence and competence in my clinical reasoning skills and my ability to care for any patient who may come through the door. Of course I am only at the beginning of my journey and have so much more to learn, but I finally feel ready to set off into the clinic to continue improving myself as a clinician. I would be remise, though, to not comment on the personal growth I have felt over the past years not just as a student, but as a human. My compassion and empathy for others has grown significantly over the past three years, not only because of this program, but because of my fellow classmates and friends whom with which I have had the opportunity to learn and grow.

As I have progressed through this program I have grown and I have learned, and thankfully, much of that learning has been of myself. I have been able to slowly come to a conclusion on what I am meant to do within this profession. As this program comes to a close and I obtain my license, I plan to pursue a path that will hopefully lead me to be a clinician and a professor within a DPT program. I plan to complete an orthopedic residency program within the near future and also give my time to providing guest lectures whenever needed and becoming a clinical instructor as soon as I am able. I do not want to be a run-of-the-mill physical therapist; I truly want to push myself to become great. In doing so, I hope that my continued growth as a clinician and involvement in the community will propel me into a teaching position where I can not only serve my community through patient care, but also serve the next generation of therapists by being the best educator I can be. I love being in the clinic and I truly love teaching in the classroom and I am prepared to take whatever steps are necessary to eventually meet this goal in the future.

Comments RSS