Proposal for improving the system of physical therapy education and the Korean physical therapist licensing examination based on a comparison of the systems in World Confederation for Physical Therapy member countries

The process of nurturing and producing health and medical service personnel, including physical therapists, comprises 3 stages: training provided by educational institutions, evaluation for qualification, and a management system after certification. [...]we needed to review the physical therapy programs in Korea and the subjects covered by the Korean physical therapist licensing examination as a first step in determining strategies for producing physical therapists with a high degree of knowledge and expertise. No standardization policies to establish a specific curriculum have been implemented. [...]we aimed to make proposals for improving physical therapist education in Korea by comparing physical therapy curricula, graduation degrees, and the allocation of subjects of items included in the Korean physical therapist licensing exams. According to the results of previous studies, diagnosis, measurement, and evaluation by physical therapists, as well as clinical decision-making, were tasks of high importance and frequency; diagnosis and evaluation were found to have higher importance and frequency than interventions [8]. In physical therapist curricula in US universities, credits for subjects regarding evaluation, differential diagnosis, and foundations of prognosis accounted for larger shares of total credits than those related to physical therapy interventions [8]. [...]to nurture and produce excellent physical therapists, the proportion of items regarding diagnosis and evaluation should be re-allocated so that the actual performance and ability of physical therapists can be evaluated.