As of March 21, 2025, MGH鈥檚 main entrance on Coxwell Avenue is closed as the next phase of our redevelopment project begins. Patients and visitors can use the new temporary main entrance on Sammon Avenue between Coxwell Avenue and Knight Street. View our campus map.
#IamMGH tells the story of our people. In celebration of National Physiotherapy Month, meet Janet Bowring, Physiotherapist at MGH.
鈥淚鈥檝e been working at MGH since 2003. People are always surprised by the number of areas that physiotherapists work in 鈥� we鈥檙e in a lot of departments! I currently work in the ICU which is my home base, along with cardiology, the Family Birthing Centre and paediatrics.
I became interested in physiotherapy in high school because my sister was getting treatment from one. During my career I鈥檝e worked in rehabilitation, neurosurgery and neurotrauma. A lot of those experiences come in handy now, especially when I鈥檓 working with patients who are heading to rehab. I feel like I鈥檓 able to help them understand what the road ahead will look like.
I think my favourite part of working with so many different people is the brief moments of personal connection you can have with patients. Maybe your personality gels or they just have these really funny one-liners that crack the whole room up. But mostly I think it鈥檚 the people that have surprised me with their grace and humour despite being critically ill that have stuck with me. They鈥檙e hard to forget.
COVID-19 has definitely impacted the variety of people we see and how we鈥檙e treating them. All of the patients we see present differently. In the ICU, we have patients who are very sick and are often intubated so our role focuses a lot on maintenance 鈥� doing joint movements and making sure they aren鈥檛 getting stiff. Once they are awake, our role becomes bigger. We鈥檙e making sure they can move, helping them get reoriented 鈥� all while making sure we鈥檙e staying safe.
The one positive outcome of COVID-19 has been how it has brought my peers and I together. Physiotherapy is an evidence-based practice but COVID-19 is so new that we don鈥檛 have a lot of evidence to go off of. So over the last few weeks, physiotherapists across several hospitals have been informally connecting to compare notes and see if we can identify some guiding principles to help all of our patients. It has united us and allowed us to meet people we wouldn鈥檛 have otherwise.
As a profession, physiotherapy is so interesting. It鈥檚 not a job- it鈥檚 a lifelong career. There's an art and science to it but it also comes down to following your gut. Sometimes a patient will seem fine on paper but something in your gut will say something isn鈥檛 right 鈥� trust it. At the end of the day you鈥檙e following your instinct to keep your patients safe.
For any students who are contemplating getting into physiotherapy, I say go for it! Try your best to get some in-person experience 鈥� either by volunteering somewhere or maybe shadowing a person at work. It will give you a true insight to what happens behind-the-scenes. But most importantly 鈥� don鈥檛 give up!"