Therapists play a principal role in treatment in rehabilitation medicine, and effective therapist education is extremely important. Our policy of education is “education for clinical practice”. The main goal of medical professionals is to save and help as many patients as possible in their lifetime. We are implementing a new system of education for therapists (the Clinical-Oriented System for Progression & Innovation of Rehabilitation Education [COSPIRE]) based on our insight into the problems of therapist education in Japan. COSPIRE's educational policy is to provide the following items.
New therapist education system：COSPIRE
- Heart ：This focuses on embracing a way of life that values an active attitude and scientific curiosity as well as an altruistic code of service to others, and to become an excellent medical professional.
- Brain ：To learn to think scientifically, the perspective of metacognition and meta-learning is necessary. In addition to learning specific and practical methods and knowledge called "know-how," learning the method of learning (meta-learning) enables lifelong learning.
- Hand ：Emphasis is placed on the acquisition of practical skills through systematic clinical trainings. The Objective Structured Clinical Examination (OSCE), a version of the objective clinical competency examination for therapists developed by Fujita Health University, increases the certainty of skill acquisition, and rich practical training time brings high-quality skills.
- Tool ：Computer literacy, English literacy, and the ability to use textbooks and literature as learning tools ensure lifelong progress. Further, advanced tools such as rehabilitation robots are available.
- Suit ：Developing interpersonal skills is essential for building smooth communication with patients and colleagues. Good interpersonal skills allow flexible clinical practice. This is one of the major objectives of clinical training.
Our university is the first in Japan to develop and introduce the OSCE for education of physical and occupational therapists, which has been highly acclaimed. We have also begun to utilize rehabilitation robots in education with the goal of standardizing and structuring the educational contents.
OSCE（Objective Structured Clinical Examination）for therapists
