Too much advice?

When I was on placement in a musculoskeletal out-patient setting, there were two supervisors in the same facility. Both of them were knowledgeable, friendly and enthusiastic in teaching, I really enjoyed while I was there.

As a student, I really appreciate to have two supervisors since you’ve learnt heaps and you’ve got more support when in a difficult situation. However, there are some problems as well, here is my story and I would like to share with you.

During the third week of that placement, I had a patient with shoulder problem. After the subjective and objective examinations, I discussed my findings with one of the supervisors; we decided the stiffness in patient’s thoracic spine was the culprit of his shoulder problem and mobilization of his shoulder was not indicated.

So during that session, his treatments consisted of mobilization of thoracic spine and postural education. The whole session was going smooth and when I wanted to conclude the session, another supervisor came in and checked.

I told her my rationale of treatments but she disagreed, she said I should focus more on the shoulder and suggested me to try mobilizing the shoulder. Thus, I tried a few sets of mobilization of shoulder on that patient.

From my point of view, mobilization of shoulder was not indicated in that case however I still did it since I was quite open-minded about different treatment options and I really would like to see whether shoulder mobilization could make a difference. Even if it didn’t work, it was not going to harm that patient.

If you were me, what would you do? Stick to your own decision or try the technique suggested by the 2nd supervisor.