Abstract
The Doctor of Athletic Training program is designed to help athletic trainers transform into scholarly clinicians. Direct evidence of the transformation into a scholarly clinician is provided by a culminating product, the Dissertation of Clinical Practice Improvement (DoCPI). Included in this dissertation is a Plan of Advanced Practice (PoAP), an objective plan uniquely designed to guide the athletic trainer towards advanced practice. The PoAP is fluid in nature and includes a reflection on current clinical knowledge, a description of strengths and weaknesses, current philosophies on patient care, and future professional goals. The present DoCPI contains further evidence of advancement as a scholarly clinician in the analysis of clinician and patient-centered outcomes and a presentation of residency findings. Included in the residency findings is a summary of key clinical learning experiences, an analysis of selected patient outcomes associated with these learning experiences, a reflection on the findings, and a revised plan for each subsequent semester of clinical residency. The cyclical nature of the residency findings presentation reflects the action research (AR) philosophy used by the scholarly clinician to study and transform their clinical practice. As scholarly clinicians, students of the DAT choose an area of focus in patient care and create practice-based evidence (PBE) through a clinical research project. A review of literature is included in this dissertation detailing the topic of meniscal tears and a potential alternative manual therapy treatment option using the Mulligan Concept. The final component of this dissertation is the presentation of a collaborative multi-site research project involving the treatment of meniscal tears using the Mulligan Concept “Squeeze” technique. Together, all components of this dissertation exemplifies the complete development of the scholarly clinician.