Forecasting requirements for physical therapists

Department of Preventive Medicine/Biometry, Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences, Bethesda, MD 20814.

In response to the existing undersupply of physical therapists and the projected changes of the health care reform era, it is prudent for the profession to consider implementing a training strategy that would bring the supply of physical therapists in line with requirements. Before such a training strategy could be developed, however, the physical therapy community would need to produce a requirements forecast. This article compares the uses and limitations of the two major methods for generating health professions requirements--the "need-based" and "demand-based" approaches--and recommends a pragmatic, tailored approach to determining physical therapist requirements that uses easily obtainable data on staffing patterns of managed care plans. The proposed method draws from both need-based and demand-based models to produce complementary data on which to base policy formation.