During the second day of #WorldPhysio2021, Nirit Rotem, from Israel, and Dale Scalise-Smith, from the US, led a seminar on prevention and wellbeing. Featuring a diverse group of speakers, each speaker was given the opportunity to expand on their unique culture perspective and the role of prevention and wellbeing within that.
Donald Manlapaz spoke about his experience in the Philippines and the importance of wellness and prevention in his culture, particularly for school aged children.
Magda Fourie, from South Africa, spoke about the availability of universal healthcare and mentioned the focus on health promotion and awareness days to show the government’s effort to promote wellness to its population.
Joy MacDermid, from Canada, raised the emerging role of mental health in physiotherapy, talking about the strong link between physical health and mental health.
She said: “It’s clear that we can’t only look at physical health but also mental health.”
Diana Camargo, from Colombia, spoke about why inclusive physical activity for children is so important. She focused on projects in Colombia available for children under five years of age and for children with disabilities. Physiotherapy and sport are considered important to improve social dynamics, welfare and inclusivity.
There was a lively interactive discussion from an engaged audience at the end, where the question was raised if physiotherapists had core competencies needed for promoting prevention and wellness.
Nirit challenged the concept that wellness is merely about doing yoga in the park and suggested the term should be better defined. The panel agreed there should be more distinction between thinking about changes in a population level rather than individual level intervention.
The session closed with discussion of developing guidelines within physiotherapy to address the holistic approach to wellbeing. One of Nirit’s final points was about advocating for international collaboration and better education surrounding physical activity. She closed the session with a powerful statement: “We need to put our money where our mouth is and take physical wellness to the forefront.”
Congress sessions are available on demand to all registered participants until 8 July 2021.
