Mar 28 2023

Jablonski, Natalie

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The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Doctor of Physical Therapy

Doctoral Portfolio

The purpose of the doctoral portfolio is to document learning and to synthesize and integrate knowledge and skills gained through the DPT curriculum with the graduating student’s career plan. The portfolio provides evidence of the clinical and professional competence of the graduate.

Professional Goal Statement

  • My goal as a physical therapist is to provide high quality care to all people. I will base my practice on respect for my patient and will work alongside them as a coach to help them achieve their goals. My top priority is helping patients return to their optimal level of function and increase their independence in functional mobility. Alongside my peers, I hope to provide non-judgmental care to promote health and wellness in our society.

Career Plan

  • July 2023
    • Finish final clinical rotation and remaining UNC DPT curriculum requiresments
    • Pass the National Physical Therapy Board Exam
    • Complete the licensure process with the Georgia State Board of Physical Therapy
    • Graduate from University of North Carolina with DPT degree
  • August 2023
    • Begin job as Physical Therapist at BenchMark Physical Therapy in Statesboro, GA, treating an orthopedic population.
  • 2024
    • Become certified in dry needling as an adjunct therapy tool.
  • 2025-2026
    • Become a clinical instructor for a future DPT student once I have become comfortable with my skills as a therapist.
  • Long-term
    • Reassess my setting and population of choice to ensure that I am maximizing my areas of interest and growth potential.

Self-Assessment

  • Strengths
    • Providing person-centered and non-judgmental care to all patients
    • Flexibility with changes in work schedule
    • Receptive to feedback from both mentors and patients
    • Open communication and listening skills
    • Relevant knowledge base from B.S. in Kinesiology
  • Areas for Professional Development
    • Become involved in American Physical Therapy Association
    • Increase confidence in creating a treatment plan and correcting form throughout intervention to maximize patient progress
    • Explain rationale behind interventions to increase patient buy-in
    • Improve hands-on manual techniques to maximize patient function and improve success of other interventions
    • Supervision of support personnel including PT techs and PTAs
    • Finding access to research outside of the UNC Physical Therapy library as I transition away from being a student

Objectives

  • Pass the NPTE Board Exam in July 2023
  • Graduate from the UNC DPT program in July 2023
  • Begin job within two months of graduating from the University of North Carolina
  • Implement specific strategies throughout my career to improve my skills as a clinician

Specific Strategies

  • Follow specific study plan for NPTE, studying daily for 1 hour beginning mid-May
  • Complete the Georgia licensure application no more than 60 days prior to NPTE per GA state requirements
  • Participate in mentorship program with BenchMark Physical Therapy, including:
    • Monthly mentor meetings with an experienced clinician
    • Case study pods for evaluation and practice of hands-on manual skills
  • Regular literature review to stay up-to-date with best practice guidelines
  • Complete the required 30 hours of continuing education to maintain my licensure on a biannual basis

Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion

We began this program by reading the book Blindspot: Hidden Biases of Good People by Anthony Greenwald and Mahzarin Banaji. This book dove into the concept of implicit bias, a topic I had heard of before without extensively considering the effect on my daily life. Through completion of the Implicit Association Tests, I was surprised and honestly somewhat upset about my results. This was a similar reaction to the author Banaji who felt as though she “failed” the test. I generally consider myself a compassionate and understanding person, so realizing that implicit biases subconsciously affected my behavior was somewhat of a wake-up call. I think one of the main lessons I learned from this experience was that I will need to make a conscious effort to overcome some of these implicit biases. There have been times when I have caught myself creating judgments about a patient based on their circumstances or life choices, but it is important to start recognizing these snap judgments in order to respond to them. As we have learned throughout the program, there are many healthcare disparities that lead to worse health literacy, access to care, or ability to participate in physical activity. I plan to take all of these factors into account in order to treat patients in the most effective and nonjudgmental way possible.

One of the DEI opportunities we were given during the program was a podcast called The Most Sacred Right about the life and work of Frederick Douglass, an important player in the suffrage movement for Black individuals, women, and immigrants. This podcast was presented to us during a time of social unrest in this country following a controversial election and tension over race relations. This podcast emphasized to me truly how recent the events of slavery and suffrage occurred. I think having opportunities to reflect on this have helped me become more aware of the ways that I am privileged. Individuals in other groups have had significantly different life experiences than me, so I need to be sensitive to the different context someone may approach their healthcare. In addition to the specific DEI opportunities that were provided, we also had the opportunity during our third year to dive more into research on healthcare disparities. One 2011 systematic review described how healthcare literacy tends to be a greater issue for minorities, elderly, and individuals of low SES/education status.1 It is unfair for me to judge any of these people who have a greater number of barriers to overcome just to access healthcare. As physical therapists, I think we are positioned in a field where we can work towards decreasing some of these health disparities. Our patient education and legislative advocacy can be the building blocks towards changing a system that treats some individuals worse than others.

  1. Berkman ND, Sheridan SL, Donahue KE, Halpern DJ, Crotty K. Low health literacy and health outcomes: an updated systematic review. Ann Intern Med. 2011;155(2):97-107. doi:10.7326/0003-4819-155-2-201107190-00005

Product Examples

Reflective Statement

I feel as though overall, I am well on my way towards accomplishing my goals from the UNC DPT program. Participating in the third-year clinical rotation in inpatient rehab has allowed me to reflect back on how far I have come from my first-year acute care rotation. Previously, I was overwhelmed with just the basics of medical terminology and flow of an evaluation/treatment session. Now I feel much more confident with my baseline knowledge and have been able to start applying my clinical reasoning at a much higher level. While I feel as though I have always been empathetic and compassionate towards people, I am now better prepared to relate to patients with a wide variety of conditions and impairments. I feel more comfortable handling situations where the patient has cognitive deficits as well as discussing pain management and other difficult topics. I can definitely see the growth I have experienced but think there is still a long way to go. During my first year of practice, I really want to work on increasing my confidence and relying on my hard work/successful completion of the DPT program to help educate patients. It is easy to suffer from imposter syndrome, so I will continue to work on reminding myself that I have the knowledge necessary to assume the role of an independent PT.

Following graduation, I will be starting my career in outpatient orthopedics. Originally when starting PT school, I was heavily considering outpatient pediatrics. Throughout this past year, I had the opportunity to work as a PT Tech in an adult setting and started to realize that I felt more passionate about working in this population. I have been interested in many different settings throughout my education and have gotten the opportunity to be involved in many different clinical rotations. I am not sure whether or not outpatient orthopedics will always be the setting I favor. Currently, I am enjoying my inpatient rehab clinical rotation, so down the line, I would definitely consider a position in inpatient rehab. Luckily, our field is so versatile that I might have the chance to change settings or populations if I so choose. This is why I have done my best to become a strong generalist therapist throughout the program, with elective courses and rotations in a wide variety of areas. I plan to target my continuing education courses on the area of practice that I am in to maximize the care that I provide to that specific patient population. Over the next several years, I will work on improving my personal skill set in order to be prepared for mentoring future PT students.

2 responses so far




2 Responses to “Jablonski, Natalie”

  1.   Lisa Johnstonon 31 May 2023 at 7:48 pm

    Natalie- It is very nice to see all you accomplished over the past 3 years. You are certainly well on your way to achieving your professional goal and yet it is also nice to see that you are thinking beyond graduation. Thanks for sharing samples of your work. Nice job and good luck! Lisa

    Reply

  2.   Vicki Merceron 19 Jun 2023 at 6:16 pm

    Natalie – Great job on your portfolio! And you know how impressed I was with your capstone! I’ll look forward to seeing your future contributions to the profession. Best of luck – Vicki

    Reply

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