Physical therapy assistants enter the workforce knowing what they will be doing. When you are a physical therapist assistant there isn’t a tremendous amount of flexibility as far as what types of positions you can hold. Still, you can embark on a number of different career paths for physical therapist assistants. Here are 5 of them and more that you should know about them.
Are There Really Different Career Paths?
The answer to this question really depends on how you look at the issue. A physical therapist assistant using their credentials is going to be a physical therapist’s assistant no matter what they do. However, there are different career paths when you realize all the different settings that physical therapy assistants can work in. These different career paths take place in different settings and that is what makes each one so unique.
What Do Physical Therapy Assistants Do In Different Settings?
Physical therapy assistants do pretty much the same work in any setting that they work in. However, there are some variations involved in working in different settings. Following are the biggest potential differences from one setting to the next.
Clientele
The majority of the clientele may vary from one facility or type of facility to the next. They may work primarily with the elderly, another subgroup of the population, or they may work with the general population. It all depends upon the facility itself, the location of that facility, and other factors.
Work Hours
The hours that physical therapy assistants work may vary as well. Some facilities only provide physical therapy services during normal business hours while others provide these services on nights and weekends to cater to their patients. Doing the same job at different times may not seem like much of a change but working different hours can alter the nature of the work in surprising ways.
Salaries
The most noticeable difference in the job of a physical therapist assistant from one setting to the next is the salary. Salaries can vary wildly from one setting to another. This change in salary can be the result of the type of facility or it can be influenced by the size of the facility. Other factors like location have an impact as well.
5 Different Career Paths For Physical Therapy Assistants
The five settings listed below cover the main categories of settings in which most physical therapist assistants work. You may not have realized just how many settings require physical therapist assistants before but now you can see that physical therapy is big business. This is good news for physical therapy assistants who want some options.
1. Home health care services
2. Nursing care facilities
3. General medical and surgical hospitals
4. Offices of other health practitioners
5. Offices of physicians
These are 5 different career paths for physical therapy assistants. A new work setting may not seem like a dramatic change but a profession can look entirely different when you look at it from a new perspective. Just know that if you are a physical therapy assistant then you will always have some career options.
T.H. Rheinecker blogs frequently about how to find accredited physical therapist assistant schools online.