PHTY617 - Physiotherapists Working in Sport

Year

Credit points

Campus offering

Unit rationale, description and aim

Physiotherapists in sport can work with individual athletes, with teams and at sporting events and therefore need to have advanced knowledge and skills of triage and acute intervention. Physiotherapists working in sport need to understand and work within the sports’ specific rules, ethical and legal requirements and comply with the regulations of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA).

This unit will cover required knowledge and skills for acute field-of-play and side-line evaluation and intervention for physiotherapists working in sport and will include rapid decision-making processes for management of medical emergencies and catastrophic injuries, including spinal injuries and concussion. Safe injured athlete retrieval and return to sport will also be covered. The unit will prepare students as the physiotherapist travelling with athletes and working within a team environment. Topics will include knowledge and skills on sports integrity, including ethics in sports, risk management, media communications and up-to-date information on drugs in sports based on WADA requirements. Through incorporating 80 hours of self-directed field-of-play and side-line practice which includes providing injury prevention, acute evaluation, intervention and return to sport programs for a team or for athletes during a sporting event, students will apply knowledge and skills gained in this unit to real life scenarios.

The aim of this unit is to provide students working as physiotherapists in sport, including travelling with teams, with the tools for rapid decision making and effective management of injuries on the field-of-play and sideline, while incorporating sports rules and integrity principles.

Learning outcomes

To successfully complete this unit you will be able to demonstrate you have achieved the learning outcomes (LO) detailed in the below table.

Each outcome is informed by a number of graduate capabilities (GC) to ensure your work in this, and every unit, is part of a larger goal of graduating from ACU with the attributes of insight, empathy, imagination and impact.

Explore the graduate capabilities.

On successful completion of this unit, students should be able to:

LO1 - Explain the approach to management of the injured athlete within the context of ethical and legal requirements and the individual sport’s specific rules (GA1, GA2, GA3, GA4, GA5, GA6, GA7, GA8, GA9)

LO2 - Evaluate, select and use rapid decision making for the application of optimal management of medical emergencies, conditions and injuries in sport (GA1, GA3, GA4, GA5, GA6, GA7, GA8, GA9)

LO3 - Critically analyse, synthesise and communicate information acquired within the role of the physiotherapist working within a team or during a sporting event (GA1, GA2, GA3, GA4, GA5, GA6, GA7, GA8, GA9)

Graduate attributes

GA1 - demonstrate respect for the dignity of each individual and for human diversity

GA2 - recognise their responsibility to the common good, the environment and society 

GA3 - apply ethical perspectives in informed decision making

GA4 - think critically and reflectively 

GA5 - demonstrate values, knowledge, skills and attitudes appropriate to the discipline and/or profession 

GA6 - solve problems in a variety of settings taking local and international perspectives into account

GA7 - work both autonomously and collaboratively 

GA8 - locate, organise, analyse, synthesise and evaluate information 

GA9 - demonstrate effective communication in oral and written English language and visual media 

Content

Topics will include:

• The sports and exercise medicine and the high performance team
• Legal, ethical and integrity requirements in sport
• Athlete wellbeing, including:
• Sports specific rules and regulations relevant to the management of athlete wellbeing
• Infection control in sports (including blood rules)
• Psychological considerations for exercise, sports and performance
• Athlete mental health
• Nutritional considerations for exercise, sport and performance
• World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) regulations, including:
• Banned substances
• Therapeutic Use Exemption (TUE) process in sport
• Field-of-play and sideline assessment and management of athletes:
• With medical emergencies and other medical conditions
• With serious injuries – e.g. head injuries/concussion, spinal injuries, dental and eye injuries, fractures, dislocations, bleeding and wounds
• With neuromusculoskeletal injuries
• Including rapid decision making for return to play and or referral
• Including safe athlete retrieval
• Including specific scenarios
• Environmental guidelines for sports participation, including:
• Heat and cold exposure, heat stress and thermal load index assessment etc.
• Considerations for the sports physiotherapist travelling with a team, including:
• The sports kit
• Legal requirements – national and international
• Wellbeing and travel – e.g. sleep and time zone management
• Risk management in sports – analysis, mitigation and documentation
• Injury surveillance, including injury definition, data collection, identification of risk factors, collation, analysis and reporting

Learning and teaching strategy and rationale

ACU Online

This unit uses an active learning approach to support students in the exploration of knowledge essential to the discipline. Active learning experiences provide students with opportunities to practice and apply their learning in their work environment. Students are provided with choice and variety in how they learn, with students encouraged to contribute to asynchronous discussions, and with the option to engage in supplementary synchronous learning opportunities when scheduled. Activities encourage students to bring their own examples to demonstrate understanding, application and engage constructively with their peers. Students receive regular and timely feedback on their learning, which includes information on their progress.

This unit is delivered in "blended mode", with content and activities delivered via 'online' and 'on-campus', to facilitate enquiry-based learning. The 'on-campus' component will be delivered as intensive block (~ 3-5 days) at a designated ACU campus/location. Content delivery will consist of a series of lectures and readings to disseminate content, tutorials and discussion forums to explore and extend knowledge and skills, and practical sessions to apply rapid decision-making skills for field-of-play and sideline assessment. The overall strategy is a constructive journey from content knowledge to understanding to application.

The unit uses online delivery focused on content (e.g., readings, recorded lectures) and developing student understanding and skills of application (e.g., discussion forums, tutorial and practical sessions). The tutorial and practical sessions ('online' and 'on-campus') take an evidence-informed approach using real-life scenarios to explore and extend knowledge, understanding and skills to provide injury prevention, acute evaluation, intervention and return to sports programs for athletes, a team or during a sporting event.

Throughout, the strategy that supports student learning will reflect respect for each individual as an independent learner. Students will be expected to take responsibility for their learning and participate actively in all learning activities, including through the online environment.

Assessment strategy and rationale

In order to best enable students to achieve unit learning outcomes and develop graduate attributes, standards-based assessment is utilised, consistent with University assessment requirements. The assessment strategy in this unit has been designed to support and assess on-the-job learning. The sequence of assessment tasks include:

• An ungraded Hurdle Task, which consists of providing evidence of successful completion of the Sports Integrity Australia online short courses and recognised First Aid and CPR providing knowledge to be applied during the professional practice experience.
• Assessment 1: A short answer written task to demonstrate student ability to respond to questions based on key scenarios in the sports environment;
• Assessment 2: A viva examination based on a case scenario for field-of-play or sideline management to demonstrate student critical thinking skills and rapid decision making abilities in the sports environment during the intensive on-campus practical classes;
• Assessment 3: A professional practice experience program that incorporates the graded hurdle component of documented logbook of required ~80 hours of self-directed field-of-play and sideline practice including during a sporting event, comprising injury prevention, acute evaluation, intervention and return to sport activities for athletes or a team. A written task of reflections and a report of outcomes, enabling students to apply and reflect on knowledge and skills gained in this unit to real-life scenarios

Students must achieve a pass in both hurdle tasks and a cumulative grade of at least 50% across all graded assessments.

Overview of assessments

Representative texts and references

3D 4 Medical (2022) Complete Anatomy App: https://3d4medical.com/. Elsevier.

Brukner, P and Khan, K. (2017). Clinical sports medicine (5th edition.). Volume 1: Injuries. Sydney: McGraw-Hill.

Brukner, P. and Khan, K. (2019). Clinical sports medicine (5th edition.): Volume 2: The medicine of exercise. Sydney: McGraw-Hill.

McDonagh, Zideman, D. A., & Ackerman, K. E. (2015). The IOC manual of emergency sports medicine (McDonagh & D. A. Zideman, Eds.). Wiley Blackwell.

Sports Medicine Australia. (2013) Sports medicine for sports trainers (10th edition.). Mosby.