Burnout, Perfectionism and Moral Injury in UK Physiotherapists: What an Interview Study and a National Survey Found

Physical therapists and physical therapist assistants in any practice setting, along with clinic managers, supervisors and clinical educators who want a plain-language account of what the published evidence says about burnout in the physiotherapy workforce and how much of it the papers trace to the conditions of the work.

Physical therapists and physical therapist assistants. Physical therapist assistants work under the direction of a physical therapist; this course is informational and does not assign evaluation, diagnosis or plan-of-care decisions.

Intended audience

Physical Therapy

Level

Intermediate

Delivery format

Online, asynchronous, self-paced course: interactive reading with audio or video, and a scored post-test.

Based on

Skamagki G, Blackburn L, Biggs D, Kolitsida M, Black C, Shanmugam S. Exploring burnout, perfectionism, and moral injury among UK physiotherapists: A qualitative study on professional fulfilment and well-being. PLoS One. 2025;20(2):e0313730. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0313730

Biggs D, Blackburn L, Black C, Shanmugam S. Physiotherapy under pressure: A cross-sectional study on the interplay between perfectionism, moral injury, and burnout. PLoS One. 2025;20(2):e0299173. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0299173

After completing this course, you will be able to:

1. Describe what the qualitative interview study reported about workload, staffing, management support and moral distress as drivers of burnout among UK physiotherapists.
2. State what the cross-sectional survey found about how widespread moderate-to-high burnout was in its sample and how much of the variation in burnout it attributed to perfectionism and moral injury together.
3. Distinguish what an interview study and a single-time-point survey can each establish about the origins of burnout, and explain where the two papers agree and where they place the weight differently between the conditions of the work and individual factors.

1. Start Here: The Question This Course Answers
2. Part One: Lived Experience of Burnout, Perfectionism and Moral Injury in UK Physiotherapists
3. Who Spoke: The Physiotherapists Behind the Interviews
4. How the Interviews Were Run and Analysed
5. What the Interviews Surfaced: Workload, Staffing, Perfectionism and Moral Distress
6. What the Interview Findings Point To for Organisations
7. Part Two: Measuring How Perfectionism, Moral Injury and Burnout Interact
8. The Survey Sample and How It Was Recruited
9. How Perfectionism, Moral Injury and Burnout Were Measured
10. What the Survey Found: Burnout Levels and the Pathway Between Factors
11. What the Survey Can and Cannot Tell Us
12. Bringing It Together
13. Where the Two Papers Agree
14. Where They Diverge: Conditions of Work Versus Individual Traits
15. What the Findings Could Mean at the Treatment Table
16. What Remains Unanswered
17. Key Takeaways
18. Post-Test and Course Evaluation

Quinn Millington, PT, DPT, ECS is the instructor of record: the licensed clinician who reviewed this course and signed off on it. The name and credentials print on the certificate.

Disclosures. This course was developed by The ConEd Solution, which has a financial interest in its sale. No outside funding or sponsorship was received. The instructor of record has no affiliation with the authors of the source publication or their institutions.

This course awards 1.0 contact hour (60 min). How you earn them:

1. Complete the course. Every lesson, in order.
2. Pass the post-test. Score 80% or higher. Retakes are allowed.
3. Complete the evaluation. A short form rating each learning objective and the course.
4. Download your certificate. It is issued on completion and stays available in My Account.

The episode time is its measured length. Reading, post-test and evaluation times are estimates.

This course is designed to satisfy the quality requirements state boards set for continuing education. Requirements vary by state, and confirming that a course fits your renewal is up to you. Each state’s own acceptance statement is in the credit panel on this page.

1. Skamagki G, Blackburn L, Biggs D, Kolitsida M, Black C, Shanmugam S. Exploring burnout, perfectionism, and moral injury among UK physiotherapists: A qualitative study on professional fulfilment and well-being. PLoS One. 2025;20(2):e0313730. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0313730
2. Biggs D, Blackburn L, Black C, Shanmugam S. Physiotherapy under pressure: A cross-sectional study on the interplay between perfectionism, moral injury, and burnout. PLoS One. 2025;20(2):e0299173. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0299173