What began as a collaboration between UNLV's dance and physical therapy departments has blossomed into a full-fledged interdisciplinary clinic, where students from the College of Fine Arts receive free physical therapy services, courtesy of UNLV’s physical therapy students.

Under faculty supervision, students provide exams that focus on general orthopedic physical therapy conditions, most commonly sprains, strains, overuse injuries, and non-specific back pain.

In addition, dance students can make an appointment for an eight-part screening that assesses mobility, posture, turnout, flexibility, strength, and more. An initial exam can also lead to a medical referral to UNLV’s Student Health Center for additional services.

“These dancers and musicians have similar demands and schedules to student-athletes,” said Dustin Clow, a physical therapy professor within UNLV’s School of Integrated Health Sciences. “This clinic is a great opportunity for our students to get some hands-on training by providing free care to these hard-working [Fine Arts] majors.” 

Clow, along with physical therapy professors Keoni Kins and Brandi Varnado, supervise the student-run clinic that teaches physical therapy students the specifics of running an actual clinic while still at UNLV.

The clinic launched five years ago as a collaboration between dance professor Dolly Kelepecz and former physical therapy professor Cassie Turner. It’s since expanded to serve music, theater, and architecture majors.

Kelepecz, who has been affiliated with UNLV dance for 50 years, is a founding member of Nevada Ballet Theatre. She said dance students can suffer a wide range of injuries.

“Achilles injuries, knee injuries, and ankle sprains are pretty prominent,” she said. “In jazz, there’s more hip and abrupt movements. In modern [dance], you are lower to the ground, so your knees are usually an issue. For ballet, the ankles and the knees take the brunt of the problems.”

Andrea Bejaran-Choto, a third-year physical therapy student, previously worked with athletes as an intern. 

“Musicians and dancers are like any other athletes who are very committed to their craft. They push themselves past those uncomfortable moments when they are in pain,” she said. 

During each patient visit, which typically lasts 30 minutes, Bejaran-Choto and her fellow classmates educate the performers on ways to limit future injuries. It is a full-circle moment where UNLV’s students become the teachers.

“Education is a huge part of what [physical therapists] do — and a lot of that education is helping these performers clear their fears,” Bejaran-Choto said. “They think, ‘If I address this issue, I can’t perform, or I can’t play.’ But we’re helping them continue to do their craft without sacrificing their health.

"These performers are still young. When you’re young, there’s still so much you can learn to do so you’re not in a lot of pain by the time you’re in your 50s.”

Learning to Run Their Own Clinic

Between four and eight physical therapy students each year volunteer at the clinic as part of their capstone project. Students’ responsibilities consist of scheduling appointments, ordering supplies, and seeing patients.

“They’re basically doing everything you would do in a regular clinic, except dealing with insurance,” Clow said. 

For Bejaran-Choto, learning the ins and outs of managing an actual clinic while still in college has been a boon for her as a future physical therapist.

“There’s a lot of administrative work that goes into it, which was something we hadn’t considered,” she said. “At a clinic, you have a scheduler; we don’t have that. We’re in charge of our own patients, reaching out to them to schedule follow ups and managing scheduling conflicts. It’s led to more participation in the clinic.”

Bejaran-Choto and her cohorts have also learned a little bit about marketing and self-promotion along the way too. They've gone into fine arts classrooms to promote the clinic’s free services for students. 

“A lot of the times, [artists] don’t know what’s exposing them to these injuries, so we can educate them on what could be causing them,” she said. “Maybe it’s something that they haven’t heard before.”

Providing a Much-Needed Industry Resource

Music professor Stephen Caplan is a professional oboist and for the past 20 years has taught UNLV’s music students to be cognizant of potential injuries and how to avoid them.

“Pain and injury rates generally are high for musicians, and even higher for dancers,” Caplan said. “Based on many research studies internationally, as many as 80% of musicians and 90% of dancers experience pain or injury from practicing their craft.

“Having the clinic as an outlet for these students to rehabilitate has been a valuable addition. Students seem very happy that this work is helping them manage the stresses of a life dedicated to music.”

Kelepecz emphasizes how skipping cardio can lead to more injuries. 

“Most of the problems we see with our students is that they don’t warm up properly. The more tired they get, the more likely they are to get injured,” she said. “To dance is not about the muscle power, it’s about coordination and articulation.”

Dancers must manage several aspects of their lives in order to avoid future injuries and to be successful in their craft, Kelepecz added.

“It’s important how they eat, when they exercise, when they sleep — not to mention managing their studies,” she said. “As part of the arts, you’re modifying them physically, emotionally and spiritually.”

'Performing' Community Outreach

The PT-Fine Arts partnership has since grown to include the greater Las Vegas community, as UNLV hosted the Southern Nevada Healthy Performers Event in May. 

The two-day event is for dancers, gymnasts, acrobats, coaches, and others interested in preventing performance-related injuries. Caplan, Kelepecz, Clow, and other professors supervised the event while physical therapy students and other medical experts provided the clinical services.

For Bejaran-Choto, working with students from other disciplines has provided insight into the stress and injury that comes with being a full-time performer. And as she juggles life as a full-time graduate student while helping to manage a fully operational clinic, it is the opportunity to see patients for which she is most grateful.

“The clinic is one of the service-learning projects we have available to us as PT students and that’s what attracted me to it,” she said. “I thought joining this project would be a good way for me to keep the patient interaction going instead of just sitting in the classroom."