Free online courseKnee Assessment

Course Description

Knee complaints are among the most common reasons people limit activity, seek rehabilitation, or stop sport altogether. To manage them well, you need more than a handful of special tests you need a clear, repeatable assessment approach that helps you interpret what you see and feel, link it to functional goals, and decide when further investigation is warranted. This free online physiotherapy course builds practical skill in evaluating the knee with a clinician’s mindset, from observation and movement analysis through to targeted testing and clinical decision-making.

You will strengthen your ability to analyze gait and understand how the stance phase and swing phase relate to load, control, and symptoms. From there, the course guides you through assessing active and passive range of motion, resisted isometric testing, and joint play so you can distinguish mobility restrictions, contractile pain, and joint-related limitations with greater confidence. The emphasis is on making your findings meaningful: choosing the right next step, comparing sides, recognizing patterns, and documenting results in a way that supports follow-up and progression.

Screening and safety are also central to a high-quality assessment. You will learn to apply recognized clinical prediction rules for possible fracture and to understand their purpose in reducing unnecessary imaging while still flagging cases that require further evaluation. The course then develops your hands-on examination skills with commonly used tests for muscle length and soft-tissue tightness, swelling and effusion, meniscal involvement, cruciate ligament integrity, collateral ligament stress, patellar instability, and patellofemoral pain presentations.

Throughout, the learning experience is reinforced with short knowledge checks so you can confirm key percentages, indications, positions, and aims behind each assessment step. By the end, you will have a more structured way to assess the knee, communicate findings clearly, and make better-informed clinical decisions in physiotherapy practice, sports settings, or rehabilitation support roles.