"A feeling of being part of the future": a qualitative study on physical therapists' experiences of delivering digital first-line treatment for hip and knee osteoarthritis.

Abstract

Introduction: Digital options for osteoarthritis (OA) treatment are increasingly available with high patient satisfaction and acceptability. Little is, however, known about physical therapists' (PT) perception of this treatment modality.

Objective: To investigate PT's experience of delivering digital treatment for hip and knee OA using a smart-phone application.

Method: Nine PTs (mean age 36 years, women n = 5) with 3-24 months experience of delivering digital OA treatment were interviewed using a semi-structured interview guide. The interviews were transcribed verbatim and analyzed using content analysis.

Results: Four main categories arose; 1) A feeling of being part of the future, 2) Making an osteoarthritis diagnosis in a digital setting, 3) Facilitators and barriers of digital OA management and 4) Where to go from here? PTs were in general positive for digital treatment delivery but felt that a lack of visual assessments and physical examinations to enhance exercise evaluations and diagnosis accuracy was sometimes a disadvantage.

Conclusion: Digital treatment delivery was in general perceived as a time-efficient way of providing high-quality care that may increase patient motivation and adherence without violating the therapeutic alliance. Future implementations of digital OA treatment programs should consider the possibility of including real-time video calls for visual assessment.