Physical Therapy Informative Essay

I remember all the times that my father used to tell me “you should be a physical therapist, it pays well and you’d be good at it,” little did he know I hadn’t done any homework in roughly four years. Growing up during the 80’s and 90’s, times were quite different from how they are now. A few of us had video game consoles, that being said, most kids spent a lot of their time playing outdoors and being active. I was no different; like all young boys, I enjoyed sports, cartoons, rough housing and pretending not to like girls. Sports and athletics took over most of my time, even the time that was supposed to be dedicated to my studies. Once middle school came about, my grades plummeted. Always having poor grades, I wasn’t allowed to play team

Physical therapy, also known as physiotherapy in all other countries, has a very long history even though 1921 marks the establishing of the American Women’s Physical Therapy Association. Physical therapy dates as far back as 460 B.C. with Hippocrates being one of the most renowned figures in field of medicine. He believed that disease came from natural causes and injury, not by will of the Gods (Adams, 1891). With that sort of thinking around that time, he was very fortunate to have lived. Hundreds of years later, around 129 A.D another physician and philosopher named Galen of Pergamon. Galen would be know to be modern history’s first physician due to his innovative and successful methods of care. One story claims that during his time as physician to the gladiators, only 5 men died under his care on comparison to the sixty of his predecessors. In 1813, Per Henrik Ling founded the Royal Central Institute of Gymnastics. In 1894, 4 English nurses formed the Chartered Society of Physiotherapy. Back in the United States, nurses who were trained in exercise science and physical education began to be recruited by a number of organizations including the U.S. Army following the catastrophes of the first World War, hence the name American Women’s Physical Therapy Association. Up until around the 1940’s , the only methods of treatment used were the typical conventional methods of massages and rehabilitation exercises (Klinteberg,1992). It wasn’t until 1974 that new specializations in the field began to take root. Lets look at where physical therapy has advanced in today’s technological