Academic Development of Physiotherapy and Rehabilitation Students in Post-Earthquake Hybrid Education

Abstract

The earthquake that occurred in the Pazarcik district of Kahramanmaras on 6 February (2023) deeply affected everyone and caused a great loss of life. In accordance with the decisions taken throughout the country after the great disaster, part of the university education was transferred to the hybrid education system. It was aimed to evaluate the effects of hybrid education on physiotherapy and rehabilitation students from the students' perspective. A total of 156 students were included from the Departmant of Physiotherapy and Rehabilitation in this study. The questions were answered using with the Google Forms and the percentages of the answers were calculated. In this process, 14% of the students participating in the study attended a foreign language course, 22% made an observation for internship, 36% attended professional development courses, 60% researched postgraduate programmes, 62% attended online bachelor courses, 85% voluntarily attended face-to-face bachelor courses, 80% were concerned about the distance education process, 49% were trying to determine their field of physiotherapy, 67% of them had a positive change of opinion about the profession of physiotherapist, 57% of them could contact their academics, 20% of them participated in online symposium and congress, 44% of them did regular exercises and 63% of them experienced musculoskeletal pain during part of online courses in hybrid education. The results showed that even if the students who received hybrid education encountered negative situations, such as concerns about the educational process, the educational process had a positive effect on the students.