ArticleFrontiers in public health2026
Measuring readiness for disaster response in physiotherapy education: development and validation predisposition assessment tool.
Article in Frontiers in public health, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
0 citing papers in PubMed.
No citing paper in PubMed yet.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
3 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
The increasing frequency of emergencies, disasters, and humanitarian crises underscores the need for a health workforce adequately prepared to respond across disaster management continuum. Within this context, physiotherapists play an essential role in post-disaster care, yet evidence on students' readiness for emergency, disaster, and humanitarian action (EDHA) remains limited. This study aimed to develop and content-validate an assessment tool and examine physiotherapy students' predisposition, perceived competence, and readiness to assume functional roles in EDHA contexts. A two-phase study was adopted. Phase 1 comprised instrument development, including a 12-item questionnaire organized into three conceptual domains assessing predisposition, perceived competence, and readiness to assume functional roles in EDHA contexts. Content validation was performed using a two-round expert panel process with 12 experts, and pre-testing. Phase 2, a cross-sectional design, involved administering the final questionnaire to 126 undergraduate physiotherapy students from six Portuguese higher education institutions. The instrument demonstrated excellent content validity (S-CVI/Ave = 0.98). Although a majority of students reported interest in EDHA contexts (61.9%), only 35.7% felt adequately prepared. Results from the assessment tool showed high self-reported interpersonal preparedness, with 96.8% of students rating empathy and 92.9% collaboration as "good" or "very good." In contrast, 57.2% reported positive ratings for leadership. A substantial competence gap was observed in technical domains: 60.3% of participants considered themselves not or only slightly capable of delivering specialized rehabilitation training, and 42.1% reported low confidence in training peers to identify rehabilitation needs. Similarly, low perceived competence was reported in psychological first aid and burn management. Predisposition to work in disaster contexts did not differ significantly across academic years [ESSAlcoitão: χ
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.