Barriers and facilitators for physiotherapy students’ clinical reasoning skills: a case study

Senthilnathan Ramakrishnan; Marian Grace Gabor; Sureshkumar Kamalakannan; Kalyana Chakravarthy  Bairapareddy; Srinivasan  Shanmugam; Abdulai Abukari

doi:10.1080/13596748.2025.2550851

Barriers and facilitators for physiotherapy students’ clinical reasoning skills: a case study

Senthilnathan Ramakrishnan
, Marian Grace Gabor
, Sureshkumar Kamalakannan
, Kalyana Chakravarthy Bairapareddy
, Srinivasan Shanmugam
, Abdulai Abukari

The British University in Dubai
Fatima College of Health Sciences
University of Sharjah
London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine
Public Health Foundation of India
Sh. Tahnoon Bin Mohammed Medical City

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

1 Citation (Scopus)

60 Downloads (Pure)

Abstract

The aim of the study was to explore how physiotherapy
students develop their clinical reasoning skills during clinical
placements and what are the facilitators and barriers. This
case study employed qualitative methods and semistructured interviews to understand participants’ lived
experiences. The study targeted both students and their
clinical educators using a purposive sampling method to
recruit participants. Nine physiotherapy students and 26 clinical educators participated in this study. The findings showed
that the barriers to clinical reasoning include the gaps in
knowledge, skills in conducting clinical assessments, identifying patient problems and deciding on the interventions,
whereas previous placement experience and supportive strategies for clinical education were useful in facilitating the
clinical reasoning

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	785-798
Number of pages	14
Journal	Research in Post-Compulsory Education
Volume	30
Issue number	4
Early online date	13 Sept 2025
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1080/13596748.2025.2550851
Publication status	E-pub ahead of print - 13 Sept 2025

Bibliographical note

This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. The termson which this article has been published allow the posting of the Accepted Manuscript in a repository by the author(s) or with their consent.

Keywords

clinical education
clinical educator
Clinical placement
clinical reasoning skills
practise placement
physiotherapy

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10.1080/13596748.2025.2550851Licence: CC BY

Ramakrishnan2025VORFinal published version, 415 KBLicence: CC BY

Cite this

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title = "Barriers and facilitators for physiotherapy students{\textquoteright} clinical reasoning skills: a case study",

abstract = "The aim of the study was to explore how physiotherapy students develop their clinical reasoning skills during clinical placements and what are the facilitators and barriers. This case study employed qualitative methods and semistructured interviews to understand participants{\textquoteright} lived experiences. The study targeted both students and their clinical educators using a purposive sampling method to recruit participants. Nine physiotherapy students and 26 clinical educators participated in this study. The findings showed that the barriers to clinical reasoning include the gaps in knowledge, skills in conducting clinical assessments, identifying patient problems and deciding on the interventions, whereas previous placement experience and supportive strategies for clinical education were useful in facilitating the clinical reasoning",

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note = "This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. The termson which this article has been published allow the posting of the Accepted Manuscript in a repository by the author(s) or with their consent.",

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AU - Bairapareddy, Kalyana Chakravarthy

AU - Shanmugam, Srinivasan

AU - Abukari, Abdulai

N1 - This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. The termson which this article has been published allow the posting of the Accepted Manuscript in a repository by the author(s) or with their consent.

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KW - practise placement

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Barriers and facilitators for physiotherapy students’ clinical reasoning skills: a case study

Abstract

Bibliographical note

Keywords

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