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Discrimination Against Foreign Trained Physical Therapists

Foreign Trained Physical Therapists wanting to work in the United States shouldn't be stopped from taking the National Physical Therapy Examination.

The Federation of State Boards of Physical Therapy is the body that regulates Physical Therapy practitioners in the United States regardless of their education origin as long as they qualify under credentialing rules as set by different states and credentialing organization. The applicant should then pass the National Physical Therapy Examination as administered by FSBPT through Prometric to be issued a license to practice legally in the United States.

Physical Therapists practicing in the United States and everywhere else has as one of their main obligation to protect the public and ensure the competency of their practice.

It has been more than a month now since FSBPT announced their decision as made from investigations done by the agency pointing Security Breaches of the examination questions by some test takers, which is a clear violation of the United States Law.

The call and notice of the FSBPT to suspend examination registration and participation of Physical Therapy License applicants from four countries - the Philippines, India, Pakistan, and Egypt needs to be brought to a greater concern.

I strongly disagree with this decision because as an applicant, my application for licensure will be halted until the ban is lifted. The new examination will be given until they develop another set of questions exclusively for those four countries. According to FSBPT, the new examination sets and new rules for foreign applicant will have been available by the fall of 2011. The new rule will be that foreign trained PTs will only be able to sit for the examination once in a year and in selected test sites only ? separated from those educated within the United States.

On my part, the requirements set forth by the Licensing State from where I intend to work will have expired by January of 2011 and application through them took a very long time to process. Aside from the financial burden that is so heavy it took a lot of years of work to afford them.

I would like to make it clear that even though I am educated from outside that United States, I have not paticipated with the crime commited by some test takers. The FSBPT acted to do their job in protecting the public from those candidates passing the examination through security breaches, but the decision was so devastating that it covered everyone else from those four nations, including those who worked hard to become successful in meeting the passing mark of the FSBPT.

The examination may have been breached and those people involved should have been prosecuted accordingly. The FSBPT claim they found proof and so they will be able to identify those people who participated. With regard to examination questions, the questions should be updated as to present physical therapy practice to avoid breach and to assure that the FSBPT screens a candidate as being competent. Competency is a Physical Therapy obligation that is practiced for the safety of the public.

Applicants should be treated fairly regardless of education origin and race. Examination questions should assess ALL candidates equally and according to their performance on the test. Separating test questions for foreign trained from those graduates from within the United States and limiting the examination chance of a foreign applicant to once in a year is a clear discrimination act.

Now, I would like to petition to the Government of the United States of America to act to this matter to help us and do the necessary actions regarding this matter as this reflects the labor situation of medical practitioners now and tomorrow.

Foreign Trained Physical Therapists wanting to work in the United States shouldn't be stopped from taking the National Physical Therapy Examination.