Territorial differentiation of physiotherapy practices in Poland

Introduction
Probably due to an oversight in the preparation pha se of the legislative process, the Act on the Profession of Phy siotherapy limited the possibility of conducting business activity only to medical entities. Separate regulations were introduced to allow physiotherapists to work as individual and group prac titioners. Now it seems appropriate to assess how physiotherapy practices are structured in Poland.

Aims
This study aimed to perform a quantitative and qualitative analysis of physiotherapy practices in Poland, taking into account factors such as the distribution across all regions of the country, type of practice, physiotherapists’ age and education and city size.

Material and methods
The results and analyses presented in this report were based on statistical data taken from the official stati stics of the Polish National Chamber of Physiotherapists.

Results
At the end of the 1st quarter of 2020, there were over 11,000 registered individual physiotherapy practices in Poland. The highest concentration of individual physiotherapy practices was in western Poland. The most common demographic profile of physiotherapists who decided to register their practice was that of a young man with a master’s degree from a big city.

Conclusions
Future studies should utilize more complete data from other health professions and compare their results with those from other European Union and non-European Union co untries.