The significance of experiential knowledge in clinical education: a case report of final year class of physiotherapy students’ experience of being taught by a person with a lived experience of spinal cord injury

Background: Teaching models, philosophies and techniques continuously evolve and get adopted. One of these models is the role of patients or people with lived experience of a condition as teachers in clinical education. The main import of the model is to utilize the patients’ or individual’s experiential knowledge to enhance the learning journey of the students. Aim: The aim of this article is to report a final year class of physiotherapy students’ experiences of being taught by a person with a lived experience of spinal cord injury (SCI). Method: A middle-aged individual with about a 20-year experience of living with SCI was requested to teach the students about spinal cord injury, including its causes, care and any other thing on the condition the individual deemed fit. During a period of 2 hours, the individual taught the students the about the causes of SCI, its symptoms and complications, burden (psychological and social including relationships, and family), resilience, coping strategies, support groups, expectations, job opportunities, return to work, and treatments. The students were then asked to share their experience of the teaching, and the data obtained was analyzed using thematic analysis. Result: The class expressed that the teaching provided them with experiential knowledge, enlightenment and awareness, and emotional connectedness with patients, and that it influenced their perspectives on patients and the need for their care to be holistic. Conclusion: The significance of individuals with lived experience of a condition serving as teachers in clinical education cannot be emphasized. This is because, among other things, they can provide students with experiential knowledge that can enhance their ability to learn how to make effective clinical decisions.