Article

Clinical reasoning is essential in physical therapy practice. Instrumental
approaches and more recent narrative approaches to clinical reasoning guide
physical therapists in their understanding of the patient's movement disturbances
and help them to plan strategies to improve function. To the extent that
instrumental and/or narrative models of clinical reasoning represent impairments
as mere physical disturbances, we argue that such models remain incomplete. We
draw on a phenomenologically inspired approach to embodied cognition (termed
"enactivism") to suggest that the dynamics of lived bodily engagement between
physical therapist and patient contribute to and help to constitute the clinical
reasoning process. This article outlines the phenomenologically informed enactive
perspective on clinical reasoning, with special reference to clinical work that
addresses impairments as sequelae of neurological diseases.

Langue : ANGLAIS