How to become a sports physiotherapist

[amanda12]

As I say you will need to do a BSc in Physiotherapy (there are a number of unis that do it including Liverpool, Coventry, Manchester Met, Birmingham, Keele etc) you can find all the others on the UCAS website. To get into uni you will either need to do A-levels or a BTEC national diploma or equiv. external courses you might want to consider doing are a 1st aid course, sports taping and sports massage (but there isnt much point doing these until you are at uni.) the CSP (chartered Society of Physiotherapists) will be able to assist you further with courses and how to get into sports specifically.

As i say you will learn the basics of a Musculoskeletal assessment and treatment at university and then other things you will either learn on placements or once in employment or shaddowing a qualified physio.

Definately try and get some work experience both in an outpatients department (whether it be in NHS or a private clinic) and at a sports club shaddowing a physio. It will not only give you the experience and will help confirm your passion for sports physio and it will also get you known. I think a lot of the time with sports physio it is a lot of who you know as well as what you know.

I'm sorry i cant really help out much more than that as i'm still at uni myself and sports isnt an area that i wish to persue however a lot of my friends want to enter this area.

Hope I have been of some help. You will be able to get more help from qualified physios if you get some work experience with a sports physio.

Good luck!!

[persy1]

I have been a physio for over 40 years now and I currently work in private practice having spent most of my working life in the NHS. I probably get more sports injuries to treat in private practice than I did in the NHS Physio out-patients. However most private practices ask for at least 3 years post-graduate experience. It has been a wonderful career for me and I can thoroughly recommend it. For starters why don't you look at the Chartered Society of Physiotherapy's website and check out a career in physiotherapy. The URL is:-

A career in physiotherapy | The Chartered Society of Physiotherapy

You can see a list of unis that do a physio degree course at this url:-

Physiotherapy Programmes | The Chartered Society of Physiotherapy