I would like to welcome a guest author to our blog, Danille Parker. Danille is a Physical Therapist with RehabCare and is also the Director of Clinical Education for Marquette University. Thanks Danille for putting this information together!
As many of you have heard, as of July 15, 2008 the Physical Therapist Clinical Performance Instrument has transitioned to the PT CPI: Version 2006. This new web-based PT CPI offers enhanced user access, ease of completion, and data entry for students and clinical educators. The PT CPI: Version 2006 has been updated to more accurately reflect the expectations of graduates from PT programs. Updates include 18 performance criteria (divided into Professional Practice and Patient Management sections), changing of the visual analogue scale to a more defined rating scale with 6 anchors, and web based access and training.
To ensure greater consistency in the use of the instrument, online training and assessment programs are being used to teach all individuals involved in student performance assessment. The free online course provides a standardized training program and assessment designed to educate PT students, CI’s CCCE’s, and ACCE’s/DCE’s about the appropriate, valid, and reliable use of the APTA PT CPI: Version 2006. Successful completion of this training and assessment program (passing > 70%) is required for all users to access the PT CPI Web. Access to the online PT CPI: Version 2006 training can be obtained through your affiliating PT program DCE’s/ACCE’s. Contact your affiliating University for the training web-site and password. 0.2 CEUs or 2 contact hours are awarded for completing this online training module.
Aside from the PT CPI: Version 2006 training, the APTA is holding PT CPI Webinars free of cost, as a brief walk through of the web features and the PT CPI Web site. Online webinars are available the 3rd Wednesday and Thursday of every month. Please see the APTA web site under “PT CPI web launch” for webinar registration information.
For those of you that are clinical instructors and/or CCCE’s of a facility, be prepared to provide some extra information for your affiliating PT programs, including any CI specialty certifications, and personal (or work) e-mail addresses for each individual clinical instructor. This information is required to complete the online assessment, and required to input all CI’s into the main PT CPI Web data base. This information will be kept strictly confidential!
As Director of Clinical Education for Marquette University, and a Rehab Care Physical Therapist, I would be happy to assist any facilities with the transition or answer questions as needed. Feel free to contact me at Danille.parker@marquette.edu or via phone at 414-288-3719.



Thanks to everyone at Tarrant County for making us feel so welcome! We had a great visit and open discussion with the students allowing plenty of questions. We provided information on RehabCare, the Geriatric population, Long-Term Care and how Skilled Nursing Facilities are evolving from a rehab perspective. We included one of our Physical Therapist from a local facility to give the students a realistic perspective as to how our facilities function and to "pick her brain" on the clinical world. The students asked great questions and hopefully they found the presentation both informative and helpful. I look forward to my next visit and working with these PTA's in the future! How you can have RehabCare visit your campus? Contact me at 800.677.1202 ext 2521. 