Practice Analysis
The Federation of State Boards of Physical Therapy (FSBPT) is responsible for developing and maintaining the National Physical Therapy Examination (NPTE) for physical therapists (PTs) and for physical therapist assistants (PTAs). Successful completion of the NPTE, the national licensure examination for the physical therapy profession, is an important step in the process of demonstrating that an individual is competent to perform as an entry-level practitioner.
The national licensure examinations measure the knowledge and skills required for safe and effective practice as an entry-level PT or PTA. The validity of the test results for indicating competence to provide safe and effective physical therapy services is contingent upon the degree to which (1) questions on each examination measure important knowledge and skills required for safe practice, and (2) the proportion of questions measuring various knowledge and skill areas is commensurate with the importance of these areas to physical therapy practice.
A formal, systematic process referred to as an "analysis of practice" exists for determining the contents of a licensure examination (other names for this process include occupational analysis, task analysis, job analysis, and role delineation study). This process begins with the identification of work requirements for entry-level practitioners and ends with the development of a formal set of test specifications that delineates the knowledge and skills related to safe and effective entry-level practice.
Because physical therapy practice evolves, it is imperative that the contents of the licensure examinations be updated on an ongoing basis. Thus, a practice analysis must be conducted periodically to ensure that changes in entry-level requirements are incorporated into the licensure examinations. Revisiting the practice analysis regularly ensures that fewer test questions are included on skill areas of decreasing importance and that greater numbers of test questions address skill areas of increasing importance. The time frame for updating a practice analysis varies by profession; for the physical therapy profession, this analysis is conducted at least every 5 years.
Content Outlines
The examinations consist of objective, multiple-choice questions covering the major areas of physical therapy.
The PT examination consists of 250 items and the PTA examination consists of 200 items. These examinations were developed to measure knowledge and abilities required of entry-level physical therapists and physical therapist assistants.
The content outlines delineate the major content areas of the examinations. A committee composed of physical therapists and physical therapist assistants developed them based on national analyses of the tasks that physical therapists and physical therapist assistants perform.
Item Development
Questions (items) for the NPTE examinations are written by physical therapists and physical therapist assistants representing a broad range of practice settings in all parts of the country. Beginning item writers are trained by experienced staff and colleagues to produce high-quality, psychometrically sound multiple-choice test questions that cover the major areas of physical therapy practice reflected in the test content outlines. The items are reviewed by an independent panel of content experts for suitability for inclusion in the examination item bank. Before being used as a scored item on the NPTE, newly written items are pretested as unscored items to gather statistical information. The pretested items that demonstrate good statistical characteristics then become eligible to appear on the scored portion of the NPTE in future years.
Exam Committees
The involvement of a large, representative group of practicing physical therapists and physical therapist assistants and other professionals on examination committees at every stage of test development ensures that the NPTE examinations are relevant to the current practice of physical therapy. The NPTE exam committees consist of the Item Writer Coordinators, the Item Bank Review Committee, and the Examination Development Committee for the PT and PTA examinations.
Item Writer Coordinators are experienced item writers who provide the first level of review for newly written NPTE items. They work closely with item writers to ensure that their items meet the criteria to be eligible for inclusion on the NPTE.
The Item Bank Review Committee is responsible for reviewing new items sent from the Item Writer Coordinators. The committee members check that item content is relevant for entry-level practice and determine whether items are appropriate for inclusion in the NPTE item bank. They also review groups of new items before pretesting to check for overlap among concepts and review items that have been flagged as problematic during later phases of the test development process.
The Examination Development Committee determines which items are included on each examination based on the test content outline, which stipulates the content areas that must be covered and the number of questions to be included for each area. The committee members approve the final selection of items with the aim of ensuring that the examinations administered to candidates are valid and reliable.
