FAQs: Physical Therapy Graduate Program

The Mount’s Doctor of Physical Therapy Program is 3 years in length (Summer, Fall and Spring) and is equivalent to 9 semesters.

100% of Mount St. Joseph DPT graduates have passed the national examination.

While we do not have data on the starting salary for physical therapists in Cincinnati, interested individuals can check the American Physical Therapy Association.

Students who have graduated from the Mount’s DPT program and passed the national examination have gained employment in physical therapy.

Currently the physical therapy job market is excellent. Job opportunities are received by the program regularly. These opportunities are posted on our job board within the department.

Prospective students may choose any major they desire. We recommend they select an undergraduate major in an area of interest. A question we frequently ask prospective students is “What would you like to study if you didn’t choose physical therapy?”

Required courses for admission to the DPT include: 1 year each of anatomy & physiology, chemistry, and physics, all with laboratories as well as 1 course each in ethics, sociology, psychology, and statistics.

Yes, just indicate on the prerequisite form the expected date of completion.  Any invitation to the DPT class will be contingent on your successful completion of these courses.  Therefore, if you were unable to complete or fail (below a C) a prerequisite course, the acceptance would be revoked.

This scenario is dealt with case by case (on an individual basis).  If you have been working a field similar to the prerequisite course in the past 10 years, then the course will be accepted.  For example, we would accept chemistry from a commercial chemist, psychology course from someone working as a counselor.

Official course catalog descriptions for all prerequisite courses are required. Typically, the descriptions are available in your college’s course catalog for the appropriate year. Catalogs from every year are readily available at your college by contacting your registrar. Also, most colleges and universities offer online catalogs. Thus, you may copy actual catalog pages (only the relevant pages, please) and circle or highlight your prerequisite courses. You may also “cut and paste” the prerequisite course descriptions in a Word document. Please separate courses from different institutions with the name of the institution as a title.

Psychology:

Any course listed in your institution’s psychology department/program will fulfill the psychology requirement. We suggest a lifespan or developmental psychology course but this is not required.

Sociology:

Any course listed in your institution’s sociology department/program will fulfill the sociology requirement. We suggest an introductory course. However, if your institution does not require you to take an introductory course first, then any sociology course will fulfill the requirement. Additionally, some anthropology courses will fulfill this requirement. Finally, we do accept passing CLEP exam scores for sociology in place of a traditional course. If you have concerns, please contact the DPT program at (513) 244-4890 before enrolling in a course.

Ethics:

Many institutions do not have an ethics program/department. Typically, these types of courses are found in the philosophy program/department. You may take any type of ethics course, for example, healthcare ethics, business ethics, bioethics. If the course has ethics in the title, it will most likely fulfill our requirement. Sometimes courses from theology/religion programs will also fulfill this requirement, as long as a significant part of the course is ethics. For example, a course in moral decision making may suffice. If you have concerns, please contact the DPT program at (513) 244-4890 before enrolling in a course.

No exercise physiology class nor lab will not substitute for the physiology part of the A&P requirement.

No, you may take a series of courses titled Anatomy and Physiology or you may take a course in Anatomy and another course in Physiology. As long as all courses have laboratory, it does not matter which type your institution offers.

Some schools will fit a whole year of material in 2 quarters instead of 3 quarters. If this is the case, we will accept 2 quarters instead of the standard 3 quarters. However, you must contact the DPT program prior to application to confirm that your 2 A&P courses are equivalent to a full year of content.

Yes, the Mount’s DPT admission requirements include submission of the Graduate Record Exam. Prospective students are to have scores sent directly to the College of Mount St. Joseph (our school code for PTCAS is 7749). This requirement is waived for Mount undergraduate students.

The DPT program uses the GRE score as one element of the admissions process. The overall GPA, prerequisite science GPA, and interview all factor into our decision making process.

The program requires 80 clinical observation hours.

No. However, you must have a minimum of 20 hours at each of the two distinctly different clinical sites. Therefore, the maximum split between hours at the two would be 60 hours at Clinic A and 20 hours at Clinic B. Most students have divided hours close to 40/40 and 30/50. If you choose to observe at more than two sites, you may have less than 20 hours at one of the sites. Fore example, Clinic A = 40 hours, Clinic B = 30 hours, Clinic C = 10 hours. In this way, you still meet all of the requirements: the total 80 hours, at least two different practice settings, and a minimum of 20 hours in the two distinctly different sites.

Yes, your observation hours may come from volunteering or from a paid position. However, they still must include work from 2 distinctly different physical therapy clinics or facilities.

No, the clinical observation hours and documentation must be completed by the application deadline.

You must provide some documentation for your hours. If you didn’t document at the time you were doing them, you may summarize your total hours at each clinic/facility on the form. However, you must contact your supervising therapist and get his/her signature and license number on the form, confirming that you did indeed complete the hours.

No. You may provide a letter or other form documenting your observation hours. However, we do ask that you fill out the clinical summary page (page 2) so that we can more easily see your total hours at various facilities. Please note that any clinical observation form or letter must be signed by a licensed physical therapist.

Presently, there are no physical therapy scholarships available at the Mount; however, some healthcare organizations are providing tuition reimbursement in exchange for service commitments.

Current tuition and fees can be accessed by clicking here.

Students enrolled in the Mount’s DPT program will complete 42 weeks of full-time clinical internships. Additional part-time internships are required as well. Our program maintains full-time clinical internship contracts with over 300 facilities. Students are required to perform at least one clinical internship outside the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky/Eastern Indiana areas. Part-time internships all occur within the Greater Cincinnati Indiana areas.

Yes, students are required to pay tuition during their clinical internships. Additionally, costs of travel and lodging for clinical internships outside the local area are the responsibility of the student.

No, students are not paid for their clinical internship time. These experiences are educational experiences that are designed to enhance the students’ application of knowledge and skills and are extensions of the Mount St. Joseph classrooms.