Why go for mobile physio when you can go to a clinic? What might stop someone from accessing a mobile in-home physiotherapy service? These questions keep running through my mind as we launch our new mobile in-home physiotherapy business.
Physiotherapy has primarily been known to be done within a clinic or hospital, and the only rare occasions when it happens outside of these two locations is with sporting clubs or through domiciliary care. But why couldn’t it be done outside a clinic or hospital? Unlike medical care which may require tests and examinations from complex machinery and laboratories, physiotherapy mainly requires the skill and expertise of the practitioner. The only main tool a physiotherapist would benefit from would be a massage table and accompanying pillows and towels, things that would quite easily be portable.
There are two main barriers to home physiotherapy which we must deal with. Firstly, it reduces the efficiency of the practitioner. If a physiotherapist is able to see clients back-to-back, 20-to-30-minute slots, in a fixed amount of time they’d be able to accomplish more compared to the mobile in-home physiotherapist who would be slowed down by packing, unpacking, and the traveling between clients. Secondly, society is not used to in-home physiotherapy services and so they might feel awkward, uncertain and possibly vulnerable seeing a physiotherapist in their own home.
Efficiency of the practitioner however is not a concern of the client. It may affect the cost of the service, raising the price and in turn become a concern of the client, however it in itself is more a concern of the physiotherapist. And as the physiotherapist in concern, I would say that if it’s purely a in-home physiotherapy service, it doesn’t need to worry about the usual overheads a physical clinic would be concerned about and so the cost of running the physical clinic (rent, bills, etc) would be replaced with the cost of travel and time between each client. So the introductory rate we are charging clients, £35 per 30-min, at Abbey Mobile Physio is significantly less than the amount clients would be charged at a clinic, approximately £50 per 30-min.
Society is not accustomed to in-home physiotherapy services so in order to be successful, we are having to change the way society acts – obviously, a difficult task. There was a recent shift in work habits which we saw happen forcefully upon the arrival of covid. Companies were having to make their workers work from home as the government quickly changed their stance from recommendation to rule. What previously was seen as lazy practice, excuse to procrastinate, reclusive attitude has changed to normal practice which might actually help with productivity. I’m sure this is a heavily debated area so I won’t go any further with this thought, but it is evident that the societal view of ‘work-from-home’ has changed even though we’d moved from the initial reason for change – covid19. But is the current habit of society something based on reason or based on convention?
There are many rules and regulations that physiotherapists must abide by. “Physiotherapist” is a protected title, meaning that in the United Kingdom to be a physiotherapist one must be registered to the Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC). In addition to that there is the Chartered Society of Physiotherapy (CSP) that physiotherapists can join once they are a part of the HCPC. These registrations and memberships enforce the standard of practice of physiotherapy within the country, and Continual Professional Development (CPD) ensures that the standard of practice is upheld. There is full transparency of the registration and membership to the general public – anyone can search up a name in the system to ensure that they well and truly are registered and a member to those bodies. Other than ensuring high quality of practice, these bodies ensure that those who are part of it can be trusted. Any malpractice, criminal activity, or misconduct will have a physiotherapist taken off the registers. Knowing the strict and transparent registration rules and regulations, it’s safe to believe that a mobile in-home physiotherapist can be trusted within a client’s home environment. In fact, compared with other professions that provide in-home services, I would think that physiotherapists have the tightest regulations.
One last thought of a barrier which may arise as society is not used to mobile in-home physiotherapy is that going to a clinic is part of an experience. Like going to our favourite coffee shop, it’s sometimes not about the quality of the coffee itself. One might look at the whole experience – the interior design of the coffee shop, the culture of the serving staff, the music they play; and in the same way with a physiotherapy clinic, one might enjoy relaxing in the waiting room, speaking to the friendly receptionist, appreciating the decor of the treatment room. For some, there might also be a desire to escape from the home setting.
Two major positives that I can see in mobile in-home physiotherapy is that one, it empowers the client, and two, there is a community focused aspect of the concept. Being able to see clients in their own home empowers the client in the way that it’s their home, their castle. As an outsider entering their private space, I would be a helper providing them with a healthcare service they desire. This is opposed to someone entering my clinic and having to stand by the rules and practices of my clinic. The shift of power here is subtle but important as synchronously the point of physiotherapy is to empower clients to achieve their own goals, so empowering a client by having the physiotherapy session in their home will go in accordance to the point of physiotherapy itself.
In-home physiotherapy is community focused because the concept makes it less about an institution and more about the individual clients. Rather than each person being processed as part of a production line through different lists, queues, waiting areas; the physiotherapist becomes a part of each individual’s lives, appearing in homes, community events, the market square. Modern life has often become so much about productivity that it has lost the personal and relational aspect of life. It would help to remind ourselves about that and regain some of what we have lost.
So, does a physiotherapist belong in a clinic or in a home? I won’t be overconfident and delusional into thinking that I can straight up change the way society perceives physiotherapy as an in-clinic profession. Maybe mobile in-home physiotherapy will become “a thing”, or maybe it will just be a niche area. But from how we’ve looked into the barriers along with the benefits, I can say for one thing that there might really be something here and that we will really put our best into starting this. And what you can do about this is have a think and stick with us on this journey. Don’t act hastily on it, I’m not pushing you to do anything, but think about whether what I speak of here is true. And if it is, and you live in Abingdon-on-Thames, then why not take the next step in seeing the Abbey Mobile Physio?
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