Professional and Ethical Issues in United States Acute Care Physical Therapists Treating Patients With COVID-19: Stress, Walls, and Uncertainty.

Abstract

Objective: No peer-reviewed research has explored professional and ethical issues encountered by physical therapists in treating patients with COVID-19. The purpose of this study was to explore the experiences of physical therapists regarding the professional and ethical issues they encountered during the COVID-19 pandemic.Methods: The current study used reflexive thematic analysis, a qualitative research design developed by Braun and Clarke, to analyze individual interviews.Results: Analysis of the coded interviews produced 6 primary themes (uncertainty, physical therapist’s role, ethical dilemmas and moral distress, emotions, providing care and working conditions, and management and leadership influence) and associated subthemes.Conclusions: Physical therapists reported numerous professional and ethical issues across the individual, organizational, and societal realms during the COVID-19 pandemic. This study highlights the need for education and resources to prepare physical therapists for professional and ethical issues encountered during pandemics. Specifically, there is a need to define the physical therapist’s role in pandemics and prepare the physical therapy personnel for dealing with ethical issues, stress, uncertainty, and organizational changes associated with pandemics. Ethical guidelines would support organizations in delineating fair processes for triage and allocation of scarce resources for acute care physical therapy during healthcare emergencies.Impact: The COVID-19 pandemic has produced significant changes in healthcare and physical therapist practice. This study reports results of the first research study focusing on professional and ethical issues experienced by physical therapists in acute care during the COVID-19 pandemic. As the US faces an unprecedented spike in COVID-19 cases and deaths, results of this study may contribute to physical therapists’ preparation for and response to professional and ethical issues encountered in acute care during the pandemic.