Free online courseSpine Assessment

Course Description

Improve your clinical reasoning in spinal care by learning how to assess low back and neck pain with a structured, evidence-informed approach. This free online physiotherapy course is designed to help you move from isolated special tests to a coherent examination strategy: screen for serious pathology, take a targeted history, interpret key findings, and decide what the next best step is for each presentation.

You will practice applying guideline-based decision making for common spinal complaints, with emphasis on prognosis, course, and the elements of assessment that change management. The course connects signs and symptoms to meaningful clinical hypotheses, helping you recognize patterns that suggest radiculopathy, spinal stenosis, segmental instability, movement control dysfunction, or potential fracture risk. You will also strengthen your ability to differentiate mechanical pain from presentations that require urgent referral, using reliable screening tools and thoughtful analysis rather than guesswork.

Across lumbar and cervical regions, you will develop confidence performing and interpreting widely used orthopedic and neurodynamic tests. Just as importantly, you will learn how to weigh test accuracy concepts in day-to-day practice and combine findings into clusters and prediction rules to guide decisions. This makes the assessment more efficient, improves communication with patients and colleagues, and supports safer, more defensible clinical choices.

Interactive questions throughout the course help you check your understanding and consolidate key numbers, indications, and clinical implications. By the end, you will be better prepared to evaluate spine-related pain, choose appropriate next steps, and document your reasoning clearly—skills that support students, early-career clinicians, and practitioners refreshing their fundamentals in musculoskeletal physiotherapy. A certificate is available upon completion if you need evidence of your learning.