Factors That Predict Institutional Adoption of Professional Physical Therapist Education Programs

Between 1995 and 2015, the number of accredited physical therapist education programs in the United States rose from 127 to 224. Colleges and universities have been known to develop new programs in an effort to generate revenues through student tuition.

In the present study, sources of institutional revenue and expenditures were used as predictors for the adoption of physical therapist education programs.

Yearly data from the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System for 1731 higher education institutions were combined with dates from the Commission on Accreditation in Physical Therapy Education for physical therapist education program accreditation from 1995 to 2015.

A retrospective event history analysis of yearly institutional data was used to calculate the hazard of an institution adopting a physical therapist education program on the basis of institutional revenues and expenditures.

Private institutions were 62% less likely to adopt a physical therapist education program when they experienced a 1% increase in total revenue per full-time-equivalent student. Conversely, a given private institution was 2.71 times more likely to adopt a physical therapist education program for every 1% increase in total expenditures per full-time-equivalent student. Both public and private institutions experienced an increased chance of adopting an entry-level (professional) physical therapist education program when instructional expenditures rose. They were also more than twice as likely to adopt physical therapist education programs when they experienced a 1% increase in the number of students.

Causation between professional physical therapist education program adoption and the variables studied cannot be determined through observational analysis alone.

The more revenue a private institution generated, the less likely it was to add a program in the search for further revenues. As expenses rose, the chance of adoption trended upward beyond increases in institutional revenues for both public and private not-for-profit institutions.