A STUDY OF PHYSIOTHERAPY STUDENTS’ SATISFACTION AND PERFORMANCE OF ONLINE TEACHING UNDER COVID-19 PANDEMICS

Abstract

The shift to online platforms during the Covid-19 pandemic poses serious challenges to medical education, how effective online learning is for undergraduate students’education remains unknown. This qualitative study aims to compare physiotherapystudents’ satisfaction and performances shown in an online course to a control group of students who underwent the same course delivered face-to-face in the previous year. Between May and June 2020, a class of second-year physiotherapy students, trained by an experienced clinical educator, had 16-hours online lessons. Students exposed to the same course delivered with face-to-face conventional lessons in the previous academic year, served as a control group.We compared satisfaction with the online course, resulting in no differences between online and face-to-face teaching. We weighted up students’ results by comparing their mean performances with the mean performances of the same course delivered face-to-face in the previous year, founding a non-statistical significance in favor of face-to face teaching. Online teaching in entry-level physiotherapy students seems to be a feasible option to face COVID-19 pandemic, as satisfies students as well as face-to-face courses and leading to quite similar performance.