Physical therapist assistants
They are important playerson health-care teams
Editor’s note: This is one in a series of occasional articles on Central Penn’s allied-health programs.
By Jules Quare
Knightly News Reporter
Most people assume PT—physical therapy—means only that you are losing mobility, but that isn’t always the case.
The need for physical therapy can range from injuries to age to disease. Physical therapy also may be needed after medical treatment, such as surgery. Physical therapists (PTs) participate in patient recovery and most of the time see patients longer than a physician does.
jaw is workkng. They’re working in the PTA lab.
Physical therapist assistants (PTAs) help PTs care for patients in a variety of clinical settings. Central Penn offers an accelerated 18-month associate degree for students to become a PTA.
Nicole Patterson, a doctor of physical therapy (PT), is the PTA program director at Central Penn. She said she always wanted to be in health care. Many of her family members are nurses, but that was not the route she felt was for her. She tried a couple of majors in college and volunteered at a clinic, and while volunteering, Patterson fell in love with the work PTs do, and the satisfaction they showed with their job solidified her interest in physical therapy as a career.
Not only did Patterson enjoy in the working health care field—she wanted to teach, too. When a colleague mentioned a position was available teaching PTA students at Central Penn, Patterson took the opportunity, and she has been happy since then, seeing students train for and journey into their future.
Two ways to go
The program has two options: day classes for six terms, plus an internship, or evening classes for seven terms, plus an internship; both options are in accelerated 11-week terms, making it relatively quick for students to enter the PTA workforce.
Central Penn has the only PTA program in Central Pennsylvania and, according to college statistics, nearly 100 percent of Central Penn PTA graduates find employment in the field after they graduate.
Happy students
Rosana Garcia got some insight to inpatient care and started growing an interest in the health-care field after her mom needed physical therapy.
Garcia beamed while describing how the PT made her feel, and that experience inspired her to explore physical therapy as a career.
Garcia said she expected to encounter difficult material while studying to be a PTA, but she said she didn’t expect the in-depth knowledge she has, and she is grateful for her choice. Garcia feels that her experience at Central Penn has properly prepared her for working in the field, and that she has been supported through her time at the college. The 18-month program caught her eye, because she didn’t want a long-term school commitment.
Melanie Rutt went to India in 2020 on a personal service-mission trip. She said that watching children with physical and mental disabilities at a group home of Sarah’s Covenant Homes receive physical therapy interested her in being involved in that type of care. Rutt followed through with Central Penn’s PTA program and has learned about disease symptoms and changes to the body that PT addresses. She said she appreciates the new information and is looking forward to a future in pediatric care.
“I like how I am not just given information and expected to memorize it,” Rutt said. “They want us to know why things work the way they do and use critical thinking.”
As a child, Landon Burns ended up with sports injuries that required physical therapy. His experiences inspired him to pursue a health-care career. He had experience as an aide in a clinic and moved on, to Central Penn’s PTA program. Burns said he feels confident about his decision and plans to start in general PTA work in a clinical setting and maybe then move into a specialty.
Noah Cleck bounced around among careers, trying to discover what he wanted to do. Eventually, Cleck took time to research and evaluate possible careers, putting together his experiences and decided what he wanted to do. He wanted to become a PTA. Cleck satisfied Central Penn’s requirement of observing PTs and PTAs for 20 hours in two facilities—10 hours in each—before joining the program.
“On my first day there, something clicked, and I could imagine doing this for the rest of my life and be happy with it,” Cleck said.
Cleck attended a bigger college before enrolling at Central Penn but said he feels Central Penn’s smaller size fit his needs better.
Seth Little said he has always been fascinated by the workings of the human body and wanted to learn anatomy. This formed and fueled a passion to help people, by assisting in their physical therapy.
Soon after enrolling at Central Penn, Little started learning about diseases and conditions and how they present. He highlighted how resources at Central Penn, such as The Learning HUB and the PTA lab, have helped him learn.
“I feel like I’ve definitely been pushed to my limits and found that I am able to overcome the difficulty of it,” he said.
The students are satisfied with their choices and are eager to begin their careers assisting physical therapists and patients.
Quare is co-vice president of The Knightly News Media Club @ Central Penn College.
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Edited by media-club co-adviser and blog editor Professor Michael Lear-Olimpi.
