The World Physiotherapy Congress 2021 will be held online on 9-11 April 2021. As a World Physiotherapy Professional Partner, PEDro will be participating in the Congress scientific program and exhibition.

We are involved in three focused symposia:

• Accessing evidence in low resource countries (FS-09): overcoming barriers to accessing evidence in low-resource countries. This session will be presented by Anne Moseley, Jean Damascene Gasherebuka, Vincent Singh Paramanandam, Guillermo Gómez and Saurab Sharma. It will consider barriers to accessing high-quality clinical research, particularly in low-resource countries. Strategies to overcome these barriers will be investigated, including open-access resources, continuing professional development and access to full-text research articles.
• Commonly misunderstood statistics (FS-11): commonly misunderstood statistics in physiotherapy research. Quinette Louw, Clare Ardern, Mark Elkins and Rafael Zambelli Pinto will present this session. Participants will learn to recognise common misunderstandings of statistical procedures, clarify the correct meaning and appropriate uses of statistical analyses, and identify plain-English explanations of statistical results to facilitate involvement of patients in shared decision-making.
• Evidence-based diagnosis (FS-07): evidence-based diagnosis in physiotherapy. The symposia will be presented by Rob Herbert, Angela Cadogan, Chad Cook and Alessandra Narciso Garcia. Participants will learn about the logic and process of making an evidence-based diagnosis, how to locate and interpret studies of the accuracy of diagnostic tests used by physiotherapists and develop an understanding about how studies of diagnostic test accuracy are designed.

These short videos describe the plan for two of the symposia:

Anne Moseley talks about the accessing evidence in low resource countries symposium


Chad Cook explains the evidence-based diagnosis symposium


We are also involved in one workshop, called “Research into practice (WS-08): using research in clinical practice – how to read randomised trials”. Featuring Anne Moseley, Benita Olivier and David Keene, this workshop is relevant for physiotherapists who struggle with reading articles that report the results of randomised controlled trials. By the end of the workshop, participants will understand the value of using randomised trials to guide practice, be able to describe key features that reduce bias and increase usefulness of trials, and have some understanding of the latest methods for analysing and reporting treatment effects in trials.

Also keep an eye out for our e-poster entitled “Access to free full text via the Physiotherapy Evidence Database (PEDro): an observational study”.

Some PEDro people will be available during the congress to answer any questions you may have and give virtual tours of the PEDro and DiTA resources. You will find us by navigating to the “Community Hub” section of the congress platform – select the “Connect” option then “Message someone now” in the “Private chat” section and start a new chat with “Moseley, Anne”.

We look forward to meeting you online at the World Physiotherapy Congress 2021.