How do practicing physical therapists perceive anatomy education?

The purpose of this investigation was to explore the perceptions of the sufficiency and relevancy of physical therapy anatomy education among early, mid, and late career physical therapists. A survey was distributed via email through clinical networks in the greater Mid-Atlantic region, the American Physical Therapy Association Pennsylvania chapter (APTA-PA), and the American Council of Academic Physical Therapy (ACAPT) Educational Research division. 194 physical therapists responded to the survey. The survey included questions regarding how anatomy was learned in physical therapy school and Likert scale questions investigating opinions of anatomy education. Frequencies were calculated to determine the methods of anatomy education and Likert scale responses. One-way Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) was performed to compare the Likert scale responses from the groupings of survey participants. Respondents across all years of practice felt that their anatomy education was sufficient and relevant to their clinical practice and that schools dedicated enough time to teaching anatomy. Respondents who had a dissection component in their anatomy curriculum were more likely to view dissection as essential. Length of time in practice did not influence opinions on the sufficiency or relevancy of anatomy education. Dissection continues to be included in most physical therapy anatomy courses and perceived as essential for learning. Practicing physical therapists' anatomy education was viewed as sufficient and relevant with few recommendations for change. Perceptions of clinicians should be incorporated into curriculum design and reform and be gathered on an ongoing basis as more students from programs without anatomical donors graduate and enter clinical practice.

Abandonment of the Middle Cumberland Region of Tennessee during the Mississippian period: Temporal and sex differences in survivorship.

OBJECTIVES: The current research explores survivorship differences in the Middle Cumberland Region of Tennessee during the Mississippian period (ca. 1000-1500 AD). Using updated paleodemographic methods, this study investigates whether individuals from the Late Mississippian period had lower survivorship compared to individuals from the Early Mississippian period, foreshadowing groups on the brink of abandonment. Additionally, this study examines whether there were sex disparities in survivorship. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Adult age-at-death estimates from human skeletal remains (n = 545) were calculated using Transition Analysis, a Bayesian maximum likelihood method. Survivorship was reconstructed using Gompertz and Gompertz-Makeham hazards models, with Akaike Information Criterion compared to determine the best fitting model. RESULTS: For individuals surviving into adulthood, mean age-at-death decreased by 7 years from the Early Mississippian to Late Mississippian period. Marked differences between the sexes indicate lower survivorship of females compared to males. Male survivorship decreased sharply from the Early Mississippian to Late Mississippian period, from a mean age-at-death of 57.99 years to 44.45 years. Female survivorship remained constant throughout the Mississippian period (41 years). DISCUSSION: Temporal differences in male survivorship may be the result of interactions between climate change, decreased maize harvests, and sociopolitical strife. Sustained maternal mortality may have destabilized small-scale communities that characterized the Mississippian MCR, thereby precipitating population decline.

Testing inter-observer reliability of the Transition Analysis aging method on the William M. Bass forensic skeletal collection.

OBJECTIVES: Skeletal age estimation is an integral part of the biological profile. Recent work shows how multiple-trait approaches better capture senescence as it occurs at different rates among individuals. Furthermore, a Bayesian statistical framework of analysis provides more useful age estimates. The component-scoring method of Transition Analysis (TA) may resolve many of the functional and statistical limitations of traditional phase-aging methods and is applicable to both paleodemography and forensic casework. The present study contributes to TA-research by validating TA for multiple, differently experienced observers using a collection of modern forensic skeletal cases. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Five researchers independently applied TA to a random sample of 58 documented individuals from the William M. Bass Forensic Skeletal Collection, for whom knowledge of chronological age was withheld. Resulting scores were input into the ADBOU software and maximum likelihood estimates (MLEs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were produced using the forensic prior. Krippendorff's alpha was used to evaluate interrater reliability and agreement. Inaccuracy and bias were measured to gauge the magnitude and direction of difference between estimated ages and chronological ages among the five observers. RESULTS: The majority of traits had moderate to excellent agreement among observers (≥0.6). The superior surface morphology had the least congruence (0.4), while the ventral symphyseal margin had the most (0.9) among scores. Inaccuracy was the lowest for individuals younger than 30 and the greatest for individuals over 60. Consistent over-estimation of individuals younger than 30 and under-estimation of individuals over 40 years old occurred. Individuals in their 30s showed a mixed pattern of under- and over-estimation among observers. DISCUSSION: These results support the use of the TA method by researchers of varying experience levels. Further, they validate its use on forensic cases, given the low error overall.