Essential Functions for Physical Therapist Assistants
Physical Therapist Assistant students must be able to perform essential functions
during participation in the PTA program, while on clinical, and even on the job following
graduation. Standards have been adopted to provide safety and quality of care for
patients. The following standards reflect reasonable expectations of the PTA student
for the performance of common physical therapy functions.
Cognitive: PTA students must possess critical thinking skills to use in problem-solving, reasoning,
and judgment to provide safe, effective patient interventions. This includes but
is not limited to the following:
• Ability to collect, analyze, and interpret written, oral, and observed data Ability to multi-task, prioritize, and make logical decisions.
• Ability to apply knowledge of principles, safety standards, indications, and contraindications
for physical therapy interventions, including interventions for pain management, proper
use of therapeutic modalities, manual treatments for human pathology or disability,
and therapeutic exercise.
• Ability to modify treatment interventions based on sound clinical reasoning.
• Ability to remain focused and alert to the environment to ensure the safety of patients,
colleagues, other students, instructors, and families/caregivers.
Behavior: PTA students must exercise good judgment and empathy towards their patients. The
student must act ethically, show no discrimination, and treat all other persons equally
and fairly. The student must be tolerant of close contact with other students, patients,
and staff from a broad and diverse population of people of all ages, races, and socioeconomic
backgrounds. This population will also include people with varying weight disorders,
physical disfigurement, and mental or physical health problems.
This also includes but is not limited to the following:
• Ability to work with multiple patients/families and colleagues at the same time.
• Ability to work with lab partners, patients, families, and others during stressful
conditions that may consist of emotionally unstable persons, emergencies, or situations
requiring timely decision making.
• Ability to develop and maintain mutually respectful relationships with other students,
instructors, clinicians, patients, and families/caregivers.
• Ability to act safely, professionally, and ethically in the physical therapy lab
and clinic.
Communication: PTA students must be proficient in the English language to be able to communicate
effectively and efficiently with other students, instructors, clinicians,
patients, and families/caregivers. This includes but is not limited to the following:
• Competent reading skills that allow the student to safely perform essential functions
of assignments.
• Effectively interpret and express information regarding patient status, progress, and safety.
• Ability to orally communicate effectively with patients, families/caregivers, clinicians,
laypeople, and payors.
• Ability to effectively communicate in writing with other students, instructors,
clinicians, patients, families/caregivers.
• Ability to learn and navigate electronic health records (EHR) to effectively and
accurately document detailed patient information and status.
• Ability to detect and interpret non–verbal communication of others.
• Ability to develop productive and polite interpersonal communication with other
students, instructors, clinicians, patients, and families/caregivers.
• Demonstrate a willingness to give and receive constructive feedback.
Sensory: PTA students use their senses, including visual, tactile, auditory, oral, and vestibular,
to communicate and provide effective patient interventions. Students must
possess the following:
• Ability to visually recognize and interpret facial expressions and body language.
Able to read physician orders and documentation, set parameters on modalities, and
read small numbers on goniometers, thermostats, etc.
• Able to visually interpret and assess the environment and discriminate color changes.
Ability to distinguish between normal and abnormal postures/movements.
• Ability to recognize and respond to both soft and loud voices, timers, equipment
alarms/bells, and effectively use a stethoscope to measure blood pressure and lung
sounds.
• Ability to palpate a pulse, palpate soft tissue, and differentiate between normal
and abnormal tone. Ability to detect texture as well as temperature through palpation.
• Sufficient balance to assist and safely guard patients, lift exercise equipment,
and change surfaces during patient treatment interventions. Must possess adequate
unsupported sitting balance as well.
• Possess tolerance of physical touch by other students and Professors during assigned
laboratory tasks for learning purposes of physical exam and treatment techniques.
• Possess comfort and tolerance with appropriate, draped exposure of your skin to
perform assigned laboratory tasks and for learning physical exam and treatment techniques.
Motor: The role of the PTA student is physically demanding; therefore, students must possess
sufficient motor capabilities.
These include but are not limited to the following:
• Ability to stand for 8 to 10 hours per day while in class and in the clinic.
• Ability to walk several thousand feet per day. This includes incline walking and
stair ascension/descension.
• Ability to safely guard patients during gait training transfers from bed to chair
to standing and during exercise performance activities while maintaining proper body
mechanics.
• Ability to adjust and position heavy equipment in a safe manner.
• Ability to tolerate sitting for 8 to 10 hours per day during classroom and clinic
activities.
• Ability to lift, pull, push, carry, and guide weighted objects and patients up to
and including 80 pounds.
• Ability to use proper body mechanics to occasionally lift over 80 pounds with assistance.
• Ability to squat, stoop, bend, crawl, kneel, or twist safely to adjust equipment
and patients.
• Ability to climb ladders and stairs multiple times per day.
• Coordination, agility, and speed to assist and safely guard patients who are walking, transferring, or exercising.
• Ability to use fine motor skills to adjust parameters on modality devices and use small equipment such as dynamometers and/or goniometers. Fine motor skills are also used frequently for documentation and writing.
• Able to perform repetitious motions with hands, arms, and legs during lab or patient
treatment interventions.
• Ability to endure an 8 to 10 - hour day filled with patient care interventions or
laboratory tasks.
• A student enrolled in the PTA program at Collin College is expected to be capable
of the essential functions listed with or without reasonable accommodation. The PTA
program fully supports the provision of reasonable accommodations to students with
special needs to assist them with fulfilling the objectives of the program. The student
must notify the faculty as soon as possible if they cannot meet these requirements
with or without accommodation.