This comprehensive, certification course provides the tools so you can discern your clients’ physical deficits and strengths to help them age successfully.
You’ll walk away with evidence-based assessments to evaluate the key aspects of fitness central to optimal aging and learn to develop individualized treatment plans for each of your clients’ unique needs:
- The AFIT (Adult Functional Independence Test) – supported by research that includes predictive analysis and norms
- Exercises for posture, flexibility, endurance, strength, and balance
- Evidence-based practice, standardized tests, clinical reasoning, and goal setting
- First-hand demonstrations and client case studies
- Alternative options for lower level patients
- Marketing strategies to help inform the medical and general community.
- Motivational techniques to increase exercise adherence.
- And so much more!
Keeping up with new information and new treatment options can feel like a full-time job. This course does the work for you. We walk you through the latest treatment research for older adults and break it down into the most clinically relevant options for physical and occupational therapists.
With AFIT becoming the go-to assessment standard, this course gives you the tools you need to help this growing population of baby-boomers prevent additional injuries, minimize discomfort, and improve their physical functioning.
Advance your knowledge and your practice! Transform your practice and your clients’ lives with the knowledge you’ll gain from this online course and the new-found confidence you’ll have in your abilities to work at the top of your license for all your older adults!
All AFIT measures are research-based and most provide predictive analytics – the scores that indicate risk. Participants learn the evidence supporting each measure, how to correctly perform each assessment and how to explain the implications to their patients/ clients. Evidence based exercises will be provided as suggested resources for the problems identified.
Our online FSOAE course is every bit as engaging, collaborative and challenging as our face-to-face course. To make sure that you are comfortable managing the course technology so that you can concentrate on the course content, we have developed an instructional video that will walk you through the schedule, signing in, team assignments, testing groups, expectations, and how to move through the course comfortably whether this is your first-time using Zoom or you’ve used Zoom extensively and are familiar with all of its ins and outs.
Course participants will observe case studies, which include counseling patients with regard to the appropriate course of action. Information on marketing this tool to physicians, health agencies, and the community is provided and practical, how-to handouts are included that the course participants can download and use immediately.
Our online FSOAE certification course is unique in that it is highly interactive. The FSOAE designation means that you have received 20 hours of instructions and that you have successfully demonstrated competence via a written exam, a motivational interviewing assignment, and a practical clinical exam. When you complete this course, you will feel confident and be competent in assessing the functional needs of older patients and in addressing the initial steps toward needed improvements. Your FSOAE designation is proof of your skills.
The AFIT (Adult Functional Independence Test) for Optimal Aging, a 5-hour video course by Dr. Carole Lewis available at Great Seminars Online, is recommended but not required prior to taking the FSOAE course. Participants who successfully complete the FSOAE certification course will be able to use the designation FSOAE.
RECOMMENDED: The AFIT (Adult Functional Independence Test) for Optimal Aging, a 5-hour video course by Dr. Carole Lewis available at Great Seminars Online, is recommended but not required prior to taking the FSOAE course.
Day 1 (Eastern Standard Time – adjust for your time zone)
9:00 – 9:30 Optimal Aging and the Adult Functional Independent Test
9:30 – 10:00 General Health History and Posture
10:00 – 10:30 Flexibility
10:30 – 10:45 Break
10:45 – 12:00 Balance
12:00 – 1:00 Lunch on your own
1:00 – 2:00 Endurance, HR calculations
2:00 – 3:00 Strength
3:00 – 3:15 Break
3:15 – 4:00 Case Study: 79-year-old retired professor
Group Discussion: Review AFIT results, appropriate referral, exercise prescription
4:00 – 4:45 Motivation: Increasing the likelihood of exercise compliance
Motivational Interviewing video & discussion
Homework: Each person develops a Motivational Interviewing script that includes at least 4 of the 8 Motivational Interviewing Strategies presented in the video and handout
4:45-5:00 Break
5:00-7:30 Practical Exam practice. PARTICIPANTS MUST PROVIDE A MODEL FOR THIS.
Day 2 (Eastern Standard Time – adjust for your time zone)
9:00 – 2:00 Class rotates through 3 stations (1 hour and 50 min per station):
- Written, multiple choice exam
- Case study motivational interviewing presentations/role play
- AFIT performance testing: participants must demonstrate the ability to properly administer the assessments that comprise the AFIT and teach the 15 MTS exercises. PARTICIPANTS MUST PROVIDE A MODEL.
2:00 – 3:00 Working lunch – list ways the AFIT can be used in your clinic/practice
3:00 – 4:30 AFIT Level 2 – Demonstration, practice and critique of items and interventions
4:30 – 4:45 Break
4:45 – 5:45 Marketing to the community with slide presentations and flyers
5:45-6:30 How will you use this? Share ideas
Age Optimally Site, where to locate slides, brochures, order forms
6:30 – 7:00 Debrief, complete process for certification
Upon completion of this course participants will be able to:
- Demonstrate competence in the administration of the 15 assessments for middle to older aged adults that comprise the AFIT.
- Determine where patients/clients fit within the norms and cutoffs for these assessments.
- Describe AFIT score implications with regard to optimal aging.
- Provide instruction on the appropriate use of 15 exercises for the remediation of the problems found in the AFIT
- Identify and explain the evidence for using each exercise to address the specific deficit.
- Develop a marketing strategy to build awareness within the medical and general community regarding the need for performance-based, functional assessments for adults aged 50 and older.
- Develop several motivational strategies to encourage older persons to participate in appropriate exercise.
EDUCATIONAL CREDIT: A certificate of attendance for 20 contact hours of educational activity (20 CEUs or 2.0 CEUs depending on how your Practice Act determines CEUs in your state) will be awarded to registrants upon completion of the seminar. Great Seminars and Books is an Approved CE Provider for PTs and PTAs in DC, NY, KY, IL, NC and TX. Approved in CA, AR, ID, NJ, MS, and MD for 20 Clinical Contact Hours. Have applied for approval in OH, OK, and FL. Our courses also meet the guidelines for approval in PA, WI, WY, VA, AZ, DE, NH, OR, RI, UT and MO. Courses are accepted for CEUs in NE, ID, MT, WA, CT, IA, and ND. GREAT Seminars is an American Occupational Therapy Association (AOTA) Approved Provider of continuing education. Provider #5363. This course is not approved by ASHA or Board of Certification. If you do not see your state listed, please give our office a call. Your tuition is tax deductible. Any reference to or mention of state rules or regulations concerning continuing education requirements are true and accurate to the best of our knowledge at the time of print. If you have questions, please contact your board or regulating body.
WEBINAR
A webinar is live, interactive video course delivered over the Internet to your computer. You will be able to see, hear and interact with the course presenter. This live, webinar will utilize live instruction, demonstrative videos, power point slides and more. You will have an opportunity to ask questions during the seminar. A comprehensive handout will be made available to you after you register for the webinar. In many courses, demonstrative video will be used to further enhance your learning experience. All written content used in the presentation will also be made available to you for your personal use (Power Point Slides, Reference Materials etc.).
Financial Disclosure: Kele Murdin is a lecturer for GREAT Seminars. She receives payment from GREAT Seminars for the presentation of this course.
Nonfinancial Disclosure: No relevant nonfinancial relationship exists.
Content Disclosure: This course does not focus solely on any specific product or service.
Platform for Webinar: We will use a ZOOM platform for conducting this webinar.
June 21-22, 2025 - $545.00
To earn their FSOAE certification, participants will demonstrate their competence by means of a motivational planning assignment, a written exam and a practical exam.When you complete this course, you will feel confident and be competent in assessing the functional needs of older patients and in addressing the initial steps toward needed improvements. Your FSOAE designation is proof of your knowledge and skills.