The revised Research Agenda for physical therapy1 represents an important step toward the development of a strong foundation for our practice. Goldstein and colleagues should be commended for their efforts toward this important goal. The revised Research Agenda has changed significantly from the previous version2 in 3 important ways: (1) As implied by the name change, it is expanded to include more than what would typically be included as “clinical research,” most notably with the inclusion of the basic research and epidemiology categories; (2) it includes a conceptual framework that covers the range of rehabilitation research; and (3) because of the generic nature of the items, they can easily be adapted by researchers within any of the specialty areas of physical therapy, including research. Although these changes represent a tremendous improvement, I feel this new version is lacking in several critical ways. My commentary is organized around these concerns.
A Missed Opportunity to Articulate a Bold Vision of Research for the Profession
First, I am troubled by the fact that there is no clear statement about the purpose of having a Research Agenda for the profession. In the abstract, the authors state that the Research Agenda emphasizes the comprehensive nature of rehabilitation research that potentially can enhance practice—however, this is really not a purpose. In the article, the authors do state that one purpose of the revised Research Agenda was to make it broad enough so that all areas along the continuum developed by Eisenberg were included. There was no rationale provided for why the Eisenberg conceptual model was chosen in the first place, and, as such, this argument seems a bit forced, if not circular. A second purpose was to make sure the agenda is disseminated. The third purpose was to be able to share it with a broad range of funders, not just those interested in clinical research. I …
