Patient Outcomes Significantly Improve When Receiving Treatment by Athletic Therapy Students

Student-run clinics are beneficial and provide interactions between education and community. Treatment outcomes by students are rarely measured. To our knowledge, no studies evaluate student athletic therapist’s rehabilitation outcomes. The purpose of our study was to measure the improvement in function in injured patients seeking treatment at the student-run Athletic Therapy PERFORM Clinic. Main Outcomes and Measures: At baseline and at follow-up, student-treated patients completed one of three questionnaires to assess their injured level of function: Oswestry Disability Index (ODI) for low back injuries, Lower Extremity Functional Scale (LEFS) for lower extremity injuries and Disabilities of the Arm Shoulder and Hand (DASH) for upper extremity injuries. Results: On average, patients received 4.7 ± 1.8 treatments across 48.8 ± 16.1 days. Overall, patients experienced a statistically significant increase in function between assessment and follow-up (18.8% ± 20.3, p < 0.001). Patients with an acute injury improved more compared to patients with a chronic pain injury (p < 0.001). While there was no significant difference in function at baseline between patients with acute injuries and chronic pain/injuries, there was a trend towards patients with an acute injury being less functional (p = 0.051). Discussion: Improvements in function in injured patients at this student-run clinic are similar to the minimal clinically important difference respective to each questionnaire. The clinic offers an additional benefit to patients with a robust cost-effectiveness ratio. Our results suggest that Athletic Therapy education should investigate the different needs of chronic injury patients in order to maximize improvements in function