Factors influencing the quality of student learning on practice placements

Abstract

Practice/clinical placements are central to learning in healthcare programmes, and optimizing learning during placements is important. However, little literature exists on physiotherapy students’ practice placement experiences. That which has been published presents a picture of both positive and negative experiences.

The topic was addressed within a larger longitudinal study into the learning experiences of students from non-traditional backgrounds undertaking a 4-year part-time physiotherapy programme. Seventeen students from the 2000 cohort participated in the qualitative phenomenographic study. The study met institutional ethical requirements and participants’ gave written informed consent. Within the individual semi-structured interviews undertaken in the final year, participants were asked to identify the aspects of their practice placements which had least and most facilitated their learning.

Data were analysed using a phenomenographic approach, which identifies variation in the ways in which people experience phenomena. The iterative process began with identification of interview responses from verbatim transcriptions of the interviews, and ended with a set of categories of description which, together, captured the full set of participants’ responses. Representative quotations illustrated the nature and scope of each category of description and provided evidence regarding the rigour of the data analysis process.

Some categories were identified as both positive and negative, for example direct involvement with patients, educator–student interaction, with the degree and nature of context deciding on the direction of participants’ perceptions. Factors relating to placement organization were also found to have both positive and negative influences on learning. Effective communication is proposed as a means to addressing the negative aspects identified.

This study provides useful information on participant's perceptions of the quality of their clinical placement experiences. However, the research base on this important topic continues to be small, and further research is needed on physiotherapy students from both traditional and non-traditional backgrounds.