Brenau Doctorate of Physical Therapy students have increased patient care at the pro-bono clinic.
The clinic began as a volunteer-based opportunity, and now, all second-year DPT students are assigned multiple shifts per semester for a lab course credit.
“Students could volunteer as much as they wanted, but typically a student would do one or two treatment sessions a semester,” Cassidy Hray, co-director and third-year DPT student, said. “Now, we’ve created this program, so every student in our cohort is treating patients two times a week. It’s totally transformed how much experience we get before graduating, and the case load has grown substantially.”
(Sidney Chansamone/Brenau University)
The students now take their lab course on both Tuesdays and Thursdays to coincide with the clinic’s hours.
“Oftentimes, if you’re volunteering once a week, the patient will see a different therapist every single time,” Maya Langdon, co-director and third-year DPT student, said. “We wanted to change that, and wanted to learn more about building patient-therapist rapport. And, the patients we work with often ask to see the same therapist each time.”
The clinic is operated by the graduate students, who practice their PT skills while simultaneously keeping business operations running smoothly. They are supervised by faculty and volunteer clinicians, and take their first shift at the pro-bono clinic before their first clinical.
The clinic initially only treated patients referred by Good News Clinics, a Gainesville-based nonprofit that provides free healthcare for uninsured. Now, Brenau’s PT clinic is open to community members without a referral for up to eight visits or 21 days. It is also now open twice a week instead of weekly.
“We do get quite a few referrals from Good News, as well as Brenau students and faculty through direct access,” Hray said. She estimated that the student physical therapists, either individually or in pairs, can treat up to 30 patients a day.
While Good News Clinics remains their top priority, Professor Mary Thigpen, PT, Ph.D., who supervises the clinic, said being able to open up the practice to the community has been a huge success for the practice – and for the students.
“I have worked in physical therapy clinics since 1979, but I have never quite experienced the feeling I get in this clinic with our students and clients,” Thigpen said. “The students are our shining stars who bring hope, compassion, and skilled care to our clients, and a healing spirit to the physical therapy practice that is tangible.”
The idea for the clinic was developed in part by Clinical Instructor Greg Patterson, who said there was a great need for accessible care in the area. The clinic partnership between Brenau, Good News Clinics and Patterson began in February 2017, and then was re-established in 2022 following a brief hiatus due to the pandemic.
