Category: Research
Australia’s First Physiotherapist
Physiotherapy emerged from nursing and hospitals in the United Kingdom, and later physical education and the military in the United States. In contrast, physiotherapy began in Australia in private practice. Migrants, predominantly British, brought their skills and knowledge in the fields of massage, therapeutic exercise and/or electrotherapy to their new …
The Mexican Rehabilitation Institute, 1960 – 1983
The Mexican Rehabilitation Institute was founded in 1960 in Mexico City; responding to the social need for comprehensive rehabilitation for people with motor disabilities. The Institute was established as a civil society, receiving contributions from the Mexican government, private companies, and the Mary Street Jenkins Foundation. It became one of …
Angel of Summerdown: Physiotherapy’s Forgotten Benefactor
This story begins with the unusually named Almeric Paget Massage Corps. Located in the United Kingdom, the Corps was formed to serve in the First World War. It was the forerunner of physiotherapy services for wounded servicemen; and its’ success significantly boosted the profession by raising practitioner numbers, and their …
Fees and Remuneration in South Africa in the 1920’s
The South African Society of Massage and Medical Gymnastics (now known as the South African Society of Physiotherapy) was formed on 11 December 1924. It had four branches, aligned with the country’s provinces at the time: the Cape Province, Transvaal, Natal and Orange Free State. Early considerations of the Central Governing …
Are We Keeping Physical Therapy White?
Medicine has often been framed as the “ideal” profession, leading other health fields to emulate it when pursuing their own professionalisation. American medicine’s current education system came about during the early-twentieth century, as part of a multi-decade campaign to enhance the profession’s status by restricting education to an elite few, …
The Birth of Women’s Health
In 1912, Dr John Shields Fairbairn, a leading consultant obstetrician at St Thomas Maternity Hospital, London, commenced a program to revolutionise the medical approach to child delivery. He aimed to replace the 19th century medical practice of heavily medicating women during labor and the common use of force to deliver. …
100 Years of Enraf-Nonius
Enraf-Nonius is a Dutch medical equipment manufacturer celebrating its 100th anniversary this year. For many physiotherapists Enraf-Nonius have provided the equipment used across entire careers, and so they have grown in parallel with the profession. Founded in 1925 by Mr AG Hoekstra, the First Dutch X-ray Machine Factory [Eerste Nederlandse Röntgenapparaten …
Embracing Bias in Physiotherapy History
Modern medical research dictates that studies with a potential for bias be identified and excluded from a systematic review. Historical research approaches dictate the opposite. The more bias that is present in a study, the more it has the potential to indicate likely reasons, and political or social causes and …
Careers for Girls
In 1927 ‘The News’ newspaper in Adelaide, South Australia ran a weekly series of articles on their Woman’s page exploring suitable careers for girls; “a problem which at times confronts the parents of daughters”. The newspaper obtained the information for the article from an un-named “authority in the occupation”. The …
Bombed
Over 40,000 Londoners died in the bombing ‘blitz’ of World War II. Australian physiotherapist Barbara Thomas, aged 32, was amongst the first and her tragic death prematurely curtailed a remarkable career. Barbara Mortimer Thomas was the daughter of Nehemiah James Thomas and Jane Emily Nora Clapcott. She was born in …