Colleagues from Nepal prepared a lecture and a workshop for our students of physiotherapy

Two specialists in physiotherapy came for a teaching stay within the project Erasmus + KA107 - International Credit Mobility, a cooperation between the FHSS USB and Kathmandu University, Dhulikhel Hospital in Nepal. Umesh Adhikari and Smita K.C spent a week at our faculty and other places in southern Bohemia. They began with a very interesting and engaging lecture about Nepal, introducing their country and then focusing on teaching and challenges for physiotherapy in Nepal. After this a non-traditional workshop focusing on functional intensive training of children with cerebral palsy took place, with the assistance of fellow physiotherapists and occupational therapists from the Arpida Centre. "The workshop participants were children - clients of Arpida - and their parents. Students had the opportunity to experience different types of cerebral palsy, communicate with children and parents, and crate realistic goals for therapy ­– with activities and aids of daily life. The students were wonderful and actively participated in the workshop," said the director of the Institute of Physiotherapy and Selected Medical Disciplines, MUDr. and Mgr. Marcela Míková, Ph.D., who organised the programme with other colleagues from the institute, namely Mgr. Zuzana Širůčková and PhDr. Marek Zeman, Ph.D.

Another part of the programme that the Nepalese guests found inspiring was an excursion to the Arpida centre, an important clinical workplace for our faculty. Dr. Míková added: "Both guests were very excited by the extraordinary complexity of the centre and the possibilities of coordinated rehabilitation. They were very interested in hippotherapy led by a physiotherapist, something they had no prior experience with in Nepal.”

The guests also went on several excursions and visited clinical workplaces where physiotherapy students do their practice: the FHSS USB Physiotherapy Center, the Rehabilitation Department of České Budějovice Hospital, and Slatinné spa in Třeboň. They also visited the newly opened local water world and the historic centres of České Budějovice and Třeboň.