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Why should you become an early adopter of movement analysis?
You are a busy physical therapy clinic owner. You manage your own shop, your employees and also take care of customers. Your plate is full. But you still have 20% no shows. This is costing your business $100k – $200k / year in missed revenue. Yikes! Studies show that just a small uptick in retention and revenue can cause huge gains in profitability [1].
So why should you consider adding movement analysis to your practice? You are busy with running your business and treating your clients day to day. We hear you!
Here are 6 reasons why you should consider movement analysis!
#1 Seeing is believing! Use objective data to the table to bring your customer onboard.
Injuries are not fun. The treatment and recovery process isn’t always enjoyable, takes work, and creates change in the schedule of the PT client [2].
When clients first walk in the door, they are never happy. They’re in pain, they’re hurt. Building a relationship with your client and tailoring your treatment plan to their concerns is key to winning them over and getting them to come back visit after visit to complete their prescribed protocol. There is no substitute to providing amazing customer service and treating your customer with personalized attention. With that said, movement analysis complements your PT shop’s amazing service with personalized technology that will get the customer to commit ‘all-in’ to the treatment plan and recovery process.
Bring objective data and video of your patients to the discussion. By using additional tools to help communicate your expert knowledge, assessment, and plan for treatment, you improve your credibility and foster trust with your client.
In a way, your customer is your interviewing manager at every single visit. They can select to hire or fire you. Your qualifications will point them towards your door the first time. Subsequent visits, however, will largely be determined by your customer service and your capability to help condense years of expert academic and professional knowledge into a digestible manner in the manner of minutes. Complement your expertise with objective data and video proof; help your clients understand how they are moving; they will trust you even more.
#2 Shift your clients from a pain mindset to a functional mindset!
How often have you heard your patients say they are all better because the pain is gone? While it’s a good thing that your patients are making progress in their recovery, they might also be conflating lack of pain with physical health.
It is the challenge of a PT to educate their clients early on to think with a functional-based mindset, not a pain-based mindset. Typically, that process can take several sessions of repeated explanations and reinforcements. Sometimes, unfortunately, that process fails.
EuMotus customers have reported that the use of EuMotus systems reduces the length of the education process to a single (first) visit.
We think it might be because movement analysis systems produce objective data and video evidence, thereby filling a crucial role in the education process. By breaking down your client’s functional movements into quantifiable metrics, these technologies empower your clients to grasp what their improper movement patterns mean.
Once clients understand these concepts, they can fully commit to tackling the treatment protocol you prescribe. You are now working together, as a team, and improving function, rather than just alleviating pain.
#3 Give your customer another reason to come back: track progress objectively!
PT clients have reported that movement analysis excites them and gets them to come back. Why? Objective snapshots of a customer’s physical health from the beginning to their current state of their recovery progress easily showcases what they have accomplished and what still needs to be done. They easily shift from a pain mindset to one that understands and appreciates proper biomechanics. Showing progress is a reward for your clients’ efforts and behavior change.
#4 Spend more time where it matters most – with your client!
Perhaps you utilize EMR software to streamline and help reduce documentation efforts. Now that you have gained efficiencies in going digital, movement analysis software generates automated reports of clients’ functional health. Now that you are using movement analysis software, you can create more time for the highest value activities – communication with and treatment of your customer. Computerized movement analysis can now perform holistic movement assessments in minutes, with little setup time required. Not only does it provide better and more accurate results than traditional visual based assessments or 2D video playback software, it requires less of your time and effort to run. It gives you more time to communicate with and treat your customer, focusing on the areas where greatest attention is needed.
#5 Get your customer to love your practice and recommend you to their friends and colleagues
Transform your client into a champion for your PT shop. By exciting your customers through the use of movement analysis, your customers will refer you to their friends and colleagues, bringing in inbound leads. By adopting and integrating exciting, yet attainable physical therapy software into your practice, you will be the buzz of the town.
#6 Increase your practice’s revenue
Revenue and customer growth are primarily function of two key questions and variables. #1 are you adding new customers? #2 are you retaining your existing customers?
As we discuss above, a movement analysis system is an effective tool to involve your client throughout their recovery. By keeping them engaged with technology that quickly and effectively showcases their progress and their remaining deficiencies, they will be more likely to come back. So now that your customer has returned for their subsequent appointment, you have decreased customer churn and decreased missed revenues.
Also, happy clients leave good reviews, talk positively about you to their friends, and generate new clients!
Finally, you can showcase movement analysis to improve your physical therapy marketing and attract new clients with a differentiated offering. By adding these services to your practice’s website and social media pages, you demonstrate high technology and analysis capabilities to cement your positioning as a progressive and high performance clinician.
But why now?
Over the past few decades, physical therapy has experienced a refocus on movement. As a result, methodologies such as FMS and SFMA have become new standards throughout much of the world. These assessment processes require visual observation and expertise; they also require much of your time and effort.
Computerized movement analysis is designed to give you accurate and objective data in your quest to provide the best care for your clients. However, until today, most movement analysis systems (marker-based multi camera systems) were either extremely expensive or very time-consuming to use, and therefore impractical in a clinical setting.
Thanks to recent advances in infrared camera technology and processing power that can support complex algorithms, a new generation of movement analysis has come about. Not only can it help you capture accurate and objective data about your clients’ movement patterns, but it can also point you to key actionable insights into their physical health. And it can do it all in an quick, efficient, and affordable way.
Today movement analysis is finally practical for the clinician.
Want to learn how you can integrate movement analysis software into your clinic? Get in touch!
References
[1] Gallo, Amy. The value of keeping the right customers. Harvard Business Review. Oct. 2014. [2] APTA on behavior change. http://www.apta.org/PatientCare/BehaviorChange/. Accessed October 2017. [3] EuMotus performance radar. [4] Trophy. https://pixabay.com/en/cup-trophy-award-profit-2015198/. Accessed October 2017. [5] Broken Piggy Bank. http://www.publicdomainpictures.net/pictures/190000/velka/broken-piggy-bank-1472485404YoO.jpg. Accessed October 2017. [6] Microsoft Kinect. https://c2.staticflickr.com/8/7457/14175572202_64b7e17e59_b.jpg. Accessed October 2017.