EFFICACY OF THE ONLINE TEACHING IN PHYSIOTHERAPY DURING COVID-19 LOCK DOWN-A CROSS SECTIONAL STUDY

S. Bhadauria1, T. Chhotwani2, U. Purohit3, K. Kumar4
1Dr. SBT Physiotherapy Clinic & Fitness Studio, Cardio Thoracic Physiotherapy, Vijayawada, India, 2LT. Shree Fakirbhai Pansare College of Physiotherapy, Orthopaedic Physiotherapy, Pune, India, 3Jindal Naturecure Institute, Neuro Physiotherapy, Bangluru, India, 4College of Veterinary Science, Library Science, Proddatur, India

Background: As the entire world is suffering from the COVID-19 pandemic, the education is amongst the most affected part of life. Most of the educational institutions have implemented online classes throughout the world. In clinical courses, hands-on-training is of  great importance. A sudden discontinuity in the conduct of physical classes led to an abrupt halt in transfer of knowledge and skills with many unexpected and unplanned challenges. Almost all universities, therefore, started online theory and practical classes in various courses of Physiotherapy.

Purpose: The survey was planned to evaluate the efficacy and impact of online teaching in physiotherapy. The suggestions were also asked to improvise the teaching methodologies to make it more student friendly and efficient.

Methods: A Google online survey was conducted on the undergraduate and postgraduate Physiotherapy teaching from the students to obtain their feedback. The satisfaction levels were graded as 1 to 5 from minimum to maximum. The 269 responses received were subjected to statistical analysis.

Results: For online theory classes, the levels of satisfaction were 12.4%, 18%, 29.2%,16.5% and 24%  for grades from 1 to 5. For online practical classes, the responses were 44.2%, 8.6%, 13.9%, 13.5% and 19.9% for grades from 1 to 5. The opinion on the substitution of the physical classes with online theory classes was only 36% in favour whereas 64% opposed. For the question about interruption, 22.8%  students did not find any issue whereas 67.4% had connectivity problem. The major concern for online classes was about lack of interest.    

Conclusion(s): By the present survey it was concluded that with current technology, teaching methods and available resources, the online teaching is not recommended at the moment. The most common problem encountered by the students was the connectivity which may be a common problem in most of the developing countries. Therefore, it will be a big challenge for most of the countries to make a balance with the effects of present pandemic and the teaching learning ethics. However, various institutions are trying to develop many teaching tools to compensate the lack of interest and to increase the efficiency of online teaching.

Implications: The adoption of improvised online tools and techniques might help to meet the emerging challenges.

Funding, acknowledgements: NA

Keywords: COVID-19, LOCKDOWN, ONLINE TEACHING

Topic: COVID-19

Did this work require ethics approval? No
Institution: LT. SHRI FAKIRBHAI PANSARE COLLEGE OF PHYSIOTHERAPY, PUNE
Committee: INSTITUTIONAL ETHICAL COMMITTEE
Reason: HENCE IT WAS A SURVEY FOR ONLINE TEACHING, SO THE ETHICS APPROVAL WAS NOT REQUIRED.


All authors, affiliations and abstracts have been published as submitted.

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