New93 role standards, now public
MedTality
Role standards

Therapy and rehabilitation

Physical therapist assistant

What a newly licensed physical therapist assistant must be able to do under a physical therapist's direction: deliver the plan of care safely, collect and record the data the therapist needs, and recognise when to stop and hand a patient back. Drawn from the licensure examination US jurisdictions use to license or certify PTAs.

Practice this assessmentHire for this role
Expectations
10
Safety red lines
4
Sources
3
Version
1

Built from Federation of State Boards of Physical Therapy, American Physical Therapy Association. Reviewed by clinicians, last on .

01What the role is measured on#

Every verdict is made of the same five dimensions. Each is scored on its own, so a candidate sees where they are strong and where to work.

  • Clinical skillsThe hands-on and judgement work of the role: recognising what matters, acting in the right order, and knowing when something cannot wait.
  • Workflow and toolsGetting the work done in a real setting: the systems, records, equipment and handoffs the role runs on, used correctly and on time.
  • Patient communicationHow the role talks with patients, families and colleagues: listening, explaining plainly, and confirming what was understood.
  • Compliance and safetyThe rules that protect people: privacy, consent, infection control, reporting duties and the safety checks the role is accountable for.
  • Role knowledgeKnowing the job itself: what the role is responsible for, where its scope ends, and who to bring in when it does.

02What a ready hire does#

What a competent physical therapist assistant does on day one, dimension by dimension.

Clinical skills

  • Delivers the exercise in the physical therapist's plan of care, monitors the patient's response, and progresses or modifies it only within the parameters and precautions the plan sets.
  • Performs transfers and gait training with the right device, guarding and body mechanics, managing lines and equipment and keeping to the weight-bearing order.

Workflow and tools

  • Documents each session accurately - interventions with parameters, objective data, the patient's response, actual time and communication with the therapist - without recording interpretations that belong to the therapist.
  • Collects the data the therapist's plan calls for - range of motion, strength, gait, balance and outcome measures - reliably and safely, and reports it without using it to change the plan.

Patient communication

  • Confirms that a patient or carer can explain and show the key steps of their programme or a safety technique, and re-teaches differently when they cannot.
  • Explains the home programme, precautions and warning signs the plan of care sets in plain language, and knows which questions to hand to the therapist or physician.

Compliance and safety

  • Knows the vital signs and symptoms that mean a session should not start or must stop, can explain why each matters, and knows whom to call and how fast.
  • Knows the factors that make a patient likely to fall and the guarding, equipment and environment that reduce it, and applies them in every session.

Role knowledge

  • Works within the physical therapist's plan of care and the PTA's legal scope, recognises when a request or a patient's need goes beyond it, and hands it to the therapist rather than acting.
  • Escalates a concern to the supervising therapist or the right clinician so that it is acknowledged, owned and acted on, and follows up until it is.

03Safety red lines#

Any one of these keeps a candidate from Ready Day One, whatever the rest of the score. They are published so nobody meets them for the first time in the assessment.

  • Progresses or changes exercise beyond the plan of care's parameters or a surgical or medical precaution - for example adding resistance to a repair the plan protects, exceeding a weight-bearing order, or exercising past a stated heart rate or exertion limit.

    A repaired tendon can re-tear and a fixed fracture can fail, and the precaution existed because the therapist and surgeon judged the tissue could not yet take the load.

  • Would start or continue a session when vital signs are outside safe limits or new symptoms suggest instability - such as signs of a clot, chest pain, a very high blood pressure with headache or visual change, or new neurological signs - or would leave reporting it until the end of the day.

    Exercise can dislodge a clot, provoke a cardiac event or worsen a stroke, and a delayed report means the patient is not seen until the harm is done.

  • Would document treatment or minutes that were not delivered, backdate a note or write it as if it were made at the time, or sign a note for someone else.

    The therapist plans on that record and the payer pays on it, so a false entry misleads care and is fraud.

  • Performs or documents an evaluation, re-evaluation or discharge, sets or changes goals or the plan of care, changes an order on a verbal message not routed through the therapist, or treats a patient no physical therapist has evaluated.

    These are the physical therapist's legal responsibilities, and a patient treated or discharged on a PTA's judgement has lost the examination the law requires before those decisions.

04Outside the role#

Knowing where the role stops is part of the standard. Going past it is not extra credit.

  • Does not perform the initial examination, evaluation, diagnosis, prognosis, re-examination or discharge, or write or change the plan of care or goals.Collects and reports data, and asks the supervising physical therapist to make the decision.
  • Does not perform interventions APTA reserves to the physical therapist, such as thrust manipulation or sharp selective debridement, even if asked.Declines, and refers the request to the physical therapist.
  • Does not treat without the level of supervision their state law and the payer require, which varies by state and setting.Knows the rule for their state and setting and confirms the supervising therapist is available before treating.
  • Does not act on a changed order, such as weight-bearing status, until the physical therapist has updated the plan.Keeps to the current plan and gets the change to the therapist the same day.

05How it is assessed#

  • A spoken assessment

    An examiner talks the candidate through realistic cases from this role, and follows up the way a senior colleague would.

  • Five dimensions

    Each answer is read against the expectations above and rated on the same four-level scale.

  • The 70 bar

    Every scorecard shows the score against 70, overall and for each dimension, with the reason for the verdict.

  • Safety first

    Crossing one of the safety red lines holds a pass back, however strong the rest was.

The four levels

  1. Not yet
  2. Developing
  3. Proficient
  4. Exemplary
How a verdict is made

06Sources and review#

Drawn from the certification frameworks and practice standards below, and reviewed by clinicians. Version 1, last reviewed .

Cited as sources. Not an endorsement by the organizations named.

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