• Annie Rochette, Perrine Vermeulen, Joseph Omer Dyer, Marie-Christine Hallé, Marjorie Gingras, Anne Mingant, Manon Parisien, and Aliki Thomas.
• School of Rehabilitation, Faculty of Medicine, University of Montreal, Montréal, Québec, Canada.
• J Eval Clin Pract. 2024 Sep 25.

RationalePractice context is known to influence the deployment of competencies. The COVID-19 pandemic created a major disruption in many practice contexts. The objective was to understand the lived experience of rehabilitation clinicians during a major disruption of their practice context, namely, the COVID-19 pandemic.MethodsWe used a longitudinal phenomenological design. Eligible clinicians were occupational therapists (OT), physical therapists (PT), physiotherapy technologists (Phys T.), speech-language pathologists (S-LP) and audiologists (AUD), working in the same rehabilitation workplace for at least 2 years before March 2020 (the pandemic). Clinicians who were reassigned to roles outside the field of rehabilitation were excluded. We conducted individual online interviews using a guide developed by the team with expertise and knowledge of the phenomenon. An interpretative phenomenological analysis was carried out. Results were discussed until the research team reached a consensus.ResultsA total of 32 clinicians participated in the study (12 OT, 5 PT, 5 Phys T., 7 S-LP, 3 AUD), working with a variety of clienteles and work settings, for an average of 11.7 ± 7.6 years in the same practice setting. A wide range of emotions (e.g. anger, sadness, guilt, fear, pride) reflected clinicians' experience during disruption. Professional expertise was perceived as being enhanced by disruption as clinicians stepped out of their comfort zone; this encouraged reflective practice and a recognition of the need to be more explicit about their decision-making process. Collaboration with colleagues was perceived as key for effective coping and deployment of adaptative expertise.ConclusionsA disruption in the practice context may have positive effects on professional expertise through the mobilization of reflective practice.© 2024 The Author(s). Journal of Evaluation in Clinical Practice published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

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