Preface

This manual is your guide to prepare you for the National Physical Therapy Examination (NPTE) and earning your licensure. This guide includes insights from professional physical therapists (PT) on each component of the exam, encompassing a review of NPTE contents to best prepare you for successful exam results. The exam covers a broad range of topics, from special populations to the body’s main organ systems and how they interact to non-system components, outlining professional responsibilities and ethics.

This NPTE guide was written to parallel the exam and offers concise information on broad topics to help you study effectively; however, this is not the only resource you should utilize when preparing for the exam. Many resources are available to ensure you are revisiting the foundation of information you have reviewed as a part of your PT program, including your old materials from your program and other recognized online sources. This study guide will help you understand the test and its contents by providing an overview of each subject covered, along with many practice question opportunities with multiple choice questions about the subjects on which you will be tested.

The Federation of State Boards of Physical Therapy (FSBPT) describes the PT exam as a measure of the knowledge and abilities of entry-level physical therapists. It consists of 250 items to be answered in 5 hours. The questions within each section of test content are drawn from an examination item bank after ensuring they are high-quality and psychometrically sound. The PT content outline can be found on the website of the Federation of State Boards of Physical Therapy at: http://www.fsbpt.org/FreeResources/NPTEDevelopment/NPTEContent.aspx.