Are We Really Moving Forward?

So yet another year goes by and still we are no close to the formation of Pakistan Physical Therapy Council and more precisely we seem to be going backwards. Instead of being efficient PPTA became non-operational and we didn't see any activity from them this year. Moreover new substandard PT colleges now rule the earth and are willing to give admission to everyone for money observing no merit criteria at all. Practically we have achieved nothing, we all know pathetic condition of all government run institutions where the students still study under the beautiful shades of tall trees ( Yes I’m talking about AIMC). We know you have no class rooms and we share your feelings “Black” Iqbalians.

Lets talk about the Pioneer School of Punjab, The legendary School of Physiotherapy, “Affiliated” with King Edward Medical University. Since 1985 we have no proper building, no funding, no teaching staff and no basic academic facilities. The library at School of Physiotherapy has been non-functional since 2010 and no one even took a notice.

Another problem that we’ll be facing in the next coming years is excessively large number of unemployed DPT graduates with a majority of them having no clinical skills at all. By 2016 we’ll be producing more graduates every year than the whole number of graduates produced in history of Pakistan and there will be no going back.

A lot of young blood will feel that I’m being pessimist, Well, there is a fine line between being optimist and being an ignorant and being an ignorant is a choice. The conditions of the colleges and the problems stated above won’t solve themselves. Just because all our stake holders are turning a blind eye to the current situation doesn't mean they don’t exist. People like me, we want to wake you up from this sleep of ignorance.

About the condition of government colleges, yes I know the funds are quite low and the government doesn't want to spend a dime on us. Well, same is the case with every other ward and department and you know how did they survive? They took donations, they used their contacts for the good of their department instead of improving personal contacts and it can be done very easily. Some fine examples are Professor Dr. Naeem Qasuri and Professor Dr. Syed Muhammad Awais, they have transformed their setups.

The substandard graduates can be filtered by a license exam by our future PT council and promoting entrepreneur attitude in fresh graduates will help in creating more jobs for other graduates too. Quality of clinical education needs to be ensured as soon as possible. Shortly the hope lies in the future generation of Physical Therapists with a creative vision of problem solving as our current stake holders have failed us so badly that if the next generation doesn't take some major steps, the profession will drown along with our self respect.

If you are feeling depressed after reading this, its perfectly normal but instead of being hopeless we can always accept the problems and then do something about them. No matter how small the effort is or how little impact it would have, do it. Don’t wait for the leaders, do it yourself, person to person and instead of complaining about darkness, light a candle of hope and let others follow your lead. lets be first drop of rain, lets challenge the status quo of our profession and take control of what’s rightfully ours.

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