March 2020

Choosing the right physical therapy consultant for your hospital’s inpatient program can make a huge difference in your ability to accomplish your department’s goals. Physical therapy is a specialized field that requires specialized knowledge, but no two departments are exactly the same. This means that any consultant will need your help in truly understanding what makes your program tick. 

This highlights the importance of a collaborative relationship between hospital leadership and a physical therapy department management consultant. In addition to the tangibles, such as years of experience, credentials and track record, you also want to get a feel for the intangibles, including communication style and philosophy of patient care.

To help clarify this search, here are three questions you should ask when looking at prospective physical therapy consultants. 

1. How many years of experience do you have?

There really is no substitute for experience. The more hospital departments that a qualified consultant has seen, the more likely he or she has encountered and has solutions to the types of challenges you are facing. This also gives you the chance to ask follow-up questions regarding client satisfaction and success stories. Finally, when researching a potential consultant or consulting organization, more experience means a larger and more accurate sampling of their success. 

2. Does your organization specialize in physical therapy and other therapy services?

Working with a therapy-focused organization that deals exclusively with physical, occupational and speech therapy gives your hospital the ability to leverage highly specialized knowledge and resources. If the company has too broad a focus, you run the risk of working with a consultant for whom physical therapy may be an afterthought. 

3. What is your communication style and approach to patient care?

You need a physical therapy department management consultant who will provide transparent and honest communication, while being available when you need them. The way they answer this question and respond in general when first talking should establish trust and confidence. Trust your instincts; if you aren’t comfortable talking with a prospective consultant in the beginning, it can be a warning sign for the future working relationship. You also want a management partner who is as focused on patient care as you are. While reducing expenses and increasing revenue are fundamental operational requirements, a consultant needs to clearly demonstrate how better operations will help the patients under your care. 

Alliance Physical Therapy Partners has the answers you need

Alliance is an organization with more than 50 years of dedicated physical therapy experience. We’ve built successful long-term relationships with satisfied hospitals across the United States through solid communication, mutual respect and practical solutions. We’re passionate about treating our partners like family and will strive to work closely with you to understand your departmental needs and develop right-sized strategies. 

To learn more about how we can help, contact us today. Our consultants can perform a detailed evaluation of your physical therapy department to identify your current needs. 

Patient safety and quality of care are two of the most fundamental concerns for anyone in health care. Since the goal of any type of treatment is to improve overall health and quality of life, keeping the people under your care safe almost goes without saying. And the higher the quality of care is, the better the chance of a patient having a positive outcome. 

This is just as true for your physical therapy program as it is for any other service line if you’re a hospital leader. To improve patient safety and quality of care in hospital-based physical therapy, many facilities turn to organizations with a specialized focus in this field. For a clearer picture of how exactly a physical therapy partner can help, we’re happy to share the following information. 

Practical ideas for improving patient safety and quality of care in physical therapy

A partner with a focused background in physical therapy can help your department in a number of ways that positively impact both patient safety and quality of care. Here are some proven ideas that are commonly recommended:

1. Recruit and retain good people — Patient safety requires a vigilant and engaged team. By hiring talented and experienced people and developing an environment that lowers turnover rates, you can improve overall patient experience. 
2. Educate your staff — Even the best staff of therapists needs to work in a culture that emphasizes safety and quality of care. A management partner can help you put the right training and development systems in place. 
3. Plug compliance holes — Compliance isn’t just about paperwork; the regulations and standards in physical therapy exist to create a safer and better treatment environment. Truly committing to a compliance strategy will ultimately benefit your patients.
4. Upgrade your systems — Slow, outdated and incompatible software, and disorganized workflows aren’t going to help your patients receive the care they need and can potentially increase safety risks. 
5. Offer the latest services — Your department should also be up to date on the latest evidence-based practices in your field. Continually growing and developing your physical therapy program can have a positive effect on outcomes. 

To get the most out of these ideas, you need a partner who will work to understand the unique needs of your hospital and customize the solutions for your department. 

Alliance has the workable solutions your hospital needs

At Alliance Physical Therapy Partners, we believe in building long-term relationships that are built on trust, respect and honest communication. We want everything we do to stay laser focused on patient experience, quality of care, safety and positive outcomes. To learn more about how we can help, you can schedule a comprehensive assessment of your program with one of our experts. Contact us today. 

Physical therapy is an extremely important part of recovery and there is strong evidence of its effectiveness in treating conditions ranging from lower back pain to strokes. With hospital-based programs, patients gain access to physical therapy far earlier than if they were only referred to an off-site facility after discharge. This helps patients get moving and start to regain function in the critical early stages of recovery. 

While hospital administrators rightfully understand the benefits of their physical therapy department, they are also commonly aware of the associated operating costs. Even compared to other service lines, physical therapy can be notoriously difficult to administer to patients on a cost-effective basis. What’s more, it can be easy to label it as a nonessential service when it’s time to take a hard look at operational budgets. 

However, when properly managed, a physical therapy program not only contributes to a better patient experience, but it can also be a key source of revenue. By providing access to industry-specific knowledge and experience, a physical therapy consultant can help lower hospital operating costs and turn your physical therapy department into a positive contributor for your facility. 

Streamlining operational costs while improving service levels

The goal of any physical therapy consultant is to help your hospital lower costs while actually improving the level of service that your patients receive. In fact, the two should go hand in hand. Many of the most detrimental elements to patient satisfaction come in the form of departmental inefficiencies that also contribute to excessive costs. An experienced physical therapy consultant can identify solutions for these common issues that drain patient experience and budgets alike: 

• High staff turnover and lack of engagement
• Inefficient systems of work 
• Compliance issues that lead to billing errors and even fines
• Outdated systems
• Inadequate service offerings

With the right team and operational systems in place, your physical therapy department can make better use of valuable time while reducing potentially costly errors and improving reimbursement rates. 

Turn to the physical therapy consultants at Alliance

At Alliance Physical Therapy Partners, we put patients and partnerships above all else and we truly believe that lowering hospital operating costs is important to both. Our knowledgeable and experienced consultants have years of combined experience in identifying opportunities and providing workable solutions for hospitals across the United States. 

Find out how we can help you by scheduling an in-depth assessment of your physical therapy program. Contact us today to learn more.

While it’s easy to recognize the benefits of your hospital’s physical therapy program, many hospital leaders are also highly aware of the costs. As an allied health profession, physical therapy has unique practices for everything from training and accreditation to compliance and billing. Without highly specialized knowledge and experience, hospital administrators can often find themselves challenged to stay within budgetary requirements and still deliver proper levels of care. 

If any of this applies to you, physical therapy consulting can help. Working with a consultant means dedicated expertise and a laser focus on physical therapy. The right expert can help you identify the places where costs can be reduced without trading quality of care. By putting the right systems in place, you can save money while increasing revenue, turning your physical therapy department into a positive operational contributor. 

Practical cost savings measures for your physical therapy program

Here are some of the key areas that physical therapy consulting can look at to identify opportunities for cost reduction: 

• Compliance — Issues with compliance can result in costly fines and denied claims among other problems. By tightening up compliance, your department can see significant cost savings. 
• Software and workflow systems — Departmental efficiencies can slow you down, wasting personnel hours and reducing billable services. By streamlining your workflows and upgrading therapy management systems, you can save significant money on a daily basis. 
• Recruitment — Many departments suffer from high turnover rates, which can cost a lot of money in the long run. Physical therapy consulting can help with recruiting, training and development practices to reduce turnover while eliminating unnecessary administrative positions.

It’s important to find a consultant who understands that no two physical therapy departments are alike and will work to understand your hospital’s unique needs. 

Alliance has the physical therapy consulting expertise you need 

Alliance Physical Therapy Partners has expert consultants who understand all aspects of physical therapy. As industry leaders who bring more than 50 years of experience to the table, we have proven solutions and extensive resources to help you save money while keeping the focus squarely on your patients. We believe in trust, clear communication and custom solutions. 

Contact us to learn more about how our physical therapy consultants can help your hospital. We’ll perform an assessment to identify opportunities for cost savings and increased revenue.

Patient experience is the lifeblood of any successful hospital. Being happy with the treatment one receives and feeling cared for as a person play a significant role in positive outcomes across the entire spectrum of patient admissions. For administrators and executives looking to increase positive patient experience, having a hospital quality improvement strategy is essential. 

Trying to improve patient experience through higher-quality service should extend to physical therapy departments as well. By helping to jump-start the recovery process for patients dealing with a wide range of injuries and conditions, physical therapy in a hospital gets people moving and back to performing daily activities as early as possible. If a hospital is able to improve the quality of its physical therapy department, it can have a positive effect on patient experience as a whole. 

Physical therapy quality improvement to help your hospital and patients

Here are four things every physical therapy department should be doing to improve patient experience: 

1. Communicating better — Any approach to patient-centered care will be based on good communication. Hiring and training therapists who are always courteous, make eye contact, and take the time to educate and explain recommended treatments are fundamental to a superior patient experience. 
2. Valuing patients’ time — The people under your care are often in pain and are anxious about their recovery prospects. If your staff, including physical therapists, are noticeably bogged down and overwhelmed due to inefficient systems of work, patients will not receive the care they deserve in a timely manner.
3. Providing up-to-date treatments — Outdated service offerings can have a negative effect on both patient experience and outcomes. Physical therapy programs that utilize the latest advances in the field can have a better chance of helping patients achieve treatment goals and feeling satisfied with their care. 
4. Minimizing errors — From costly billing errors to privacy breaches to just getting a name or condition wrong, patients are never happy to encounter errors. Through better training and implementation of system upgrades, your department can lower the frequency of errors and develop a more frictionless patient experience. 

Do you need a partner for hospital quality improvement? 

Are you looking to achieve the above goals but are unsure where to start? With a dedicated partner for your physical therapy program, you can develop an effective strategy that improves the quality of your hospital as a whole. Alliance Physical Therapy Partners is an industry leader with more than 50 years of experience in helping facilities achieve a higher level of physical therapy service. Our experts can offer solutions for compliance, recruitment, education, strategic development and upgrading your therapy management software.

We’re happy to offer an assessment of your current program to help you identify opportunities and create an action plan to improve your patient experience. Contact us today.

For patients receiving inpatient care for a wide range of injuries and conditions, physical therapy is a key part of the recovery process. The sooner patients receive needed treatment from a licensed therapist, the better their chances are for increased function and a return to daily activities.

However, as a hospital administrator, you undoubtedly understand that physical therapy programs have unique operations, compliance, billing and staffing requirements. For some facilities, it can feel like the needs of a department don’t scale with larger budgetary needs of the hospital. Some hospitals can even find themselves in a position of questioning the overall feasibility of offering on-site physical therapy. 

Hospitals looking to improve their physical therapy management can turn to the help of a company with an exclusive focus in this area. By taking advantage of the resources one of these organizations can offer, hospital physical therapy programs can realize a host of important advantages. 

Tangible benefits of working with a physical therapy management partner

A qualified physical therapy partner can help your hospital:

• Increase revenue and decrease expenses —As a billable service, physical therapy has unique requirements for documentation and reimbursement. By implementing best practices, your department can decrease costly errors and increase accepted claims. 
• Improve patient satisfaction — Receiving physical therapy during recovery can be associated with patients reporting better outcomes and more positive experiences.
• Reduce readmissions — By increasing recovery rates, physical therapy can decrease the chances that patients will require readmission because of functional impairment. 

Proper guidance allows hospitals to better determine their needs and facilitate improved operations, compliance, communication systems and recruitment.

An experienced physical therapy management partner you can trust

Alliance Physical Therapy Partners brings decades of proven experience in physical therapy management to the table. Our depth of expertise and resources make us the partners that many hospitals turn to when they want to provide a higher level of services to their patients.

We have the people and know-how to identify opportunities and add services that better meet your departmental needs. The Alliance team can assess your current performance while offering solutions for future growth and efficiency. Contact us today to learn more.

Patients staying at a hospital can benefit from receiving physical therapy as early in the recovery process as possible. From improving patient satisfaction to reducing costly hospital readmission rates, there is evidence that physical therapy can help.However, physical therapy administration requires dedicated resources and specialized knowledge that many hospitals need assistance in delivering. 

By turning to an organization with an exclusive focus on physical therapy administration, facilities of all types can leverage this specialization on a cost-effective basis. If you’re wondering if your hospital can benefit, here are three of the most important ways a partner can help: 

1. Assistance with building a winning team 

With staff turnover, growing patient populations and tightening accreditation requirements, keeping your departmental roster full can be a challenge. With the right partner, your hospital can gain access to top talent, learn about best practices for recruiting and hiring, and implement training and development programs that keep your team engaged and armed with the latest knowledge. 

2. Strategic support for long-term growth

Many programs struggle with outdated service offerings and equipment but are unsure how to update their department in a budget-friendly manner. A physical therapy administration partner can offer guidance for expanding service offerings and growing your department while reducing unnecessary expenses and increasing revenue. 

3. Billing and compliance improvements

By reducing claims denials and lowering your exposure to regulatory fines, improved physical therapy administration can result in a significant increase in your program’s contribution to the operational stability of your hospital. A dedicated partner can help you put the right systems and workflows in place to increase efficiency and reduce errors. 

Discover the Alliance difference

At Alliance Physical Therapy Partners, we believe in patient care above all else. With more efficient administration, your team will be able to spend more time focusing on what matters: helping patients regain function and get back to daily activities. We’ll give you the help you need so you can help your patients, and we’ll do it with respectful communication and a highly collaborative approach. 

To receive a detailed assessment of your program and how to improve physical therapy administration, contact us today. 

From billing practices to staff accreditation to protecting patient health information, compliance is one of the top issues that hospitals are focused on in the current health care space. One blind spot for many administrators is keeping allied health services, such as physical therapy departments, compliant. Physical therapy is a discipline with its own unique set of best practices and regulations that require specialized knowledge and experience. 

Like any other area, noncompliance in physical therapy can result in decreased patient satisfaction, fines and lower revenue. Unfortunately, because of the specialized nature of the field, a large number of hospital leaders view physical therapy compliance as a hurdle for their facility. This is where organizations that act as dedicated physical therapy partners can offer assistance. 

Regulatory issues that physical therapy partners can address

An organization with a focus on physical therapy management for hospitals can offer expertise and specialized knowledge that facilities of any size and budget can leverage. For example, at Alliance Physical Therapy Partners, our team includes dedicated compliance support officers whose only focus is to stay on top of the latest developments in the field. 

We can partner with your hospital’s physical therapy program to help you better understand topics that are important to compliance, including: 

• Keeping EMR systems in line with regulatory standards
• Updating unit calculations
• Maintaining accreditations 
• Learning best practices for training and staff education

Compliance can be overwhelming, but with a physical therapy program partner like Alliance, you can rest assured that your department will be in line with all the necessary regulations. 

Learn more about partnering with Alliance 

We bring decades of experience in not only compliance, but staffing, workflow efficiency and strategic development to the table. Alliance has built a network of satisfied clients across the United States, including hospitals large and small, urban and rural. By treating our partners like family and providing custom solutions, we can help your physical therapy department improve patient outcomes on a cost-effective basis. 

Ready to learn more? Contact us today and talk to our team about scheduling an assessment of your current program and compliance needs.