Our Takeaways From CSM 2018

Transcript

Will: Hi, everyone. Dr. Will Dieter, Director of PT Clinical Services here at FOX Rehab.

I am fresh off the plane from NOLA. Another Combined Sections meeting is in the books, and I wanted to take a few minutes to talk to you guys about some of the things I saw at this year’s meeting that I think have been building over the years but I really saw come to a head, I think, this year in NOLA.

One of which is just the amazing positivity that I’m seeing and the profession, and it’s coming from students newer graduates people that have been doing it for five or 10 years, people have been doing it for a long time. Everybody is positive. Everybody is looking to move the profession forward.

Everyone understands some of the things that are out there that we need to deal with from a regulatory perspective or maybe other professionals sort of in the space. But the point is that everyone understands that and everyone is taking that information and talking to each other and moving forward.

The other point that goes along with this is just the fact that CSM is growing and growing quickly. This CSM, we had more than 17,000 participants. I remember three or four years ago, we were excited when we got over 10,000. So we went from 10 to 17 in only a couple of years here. And again I think it goes back to just a workforce and a bunch of professionals that are truly engaged that want to do more that are positive and everyone is there in one spot talking to each other they’re collaborating.

They’re looking past maybe, “I work for a company x and you work for Company Y.” It’s all about everybody coming together. Everybody sharing ideas. Everybody getting things moving in a positive direction. Maybe, it’s evidence-based practice. Maybe, it’s regulatory type things. Maybe, it’s innovative modeling of practice whatever – it may be.

You’ve got a ton of people in one spot that are amped up to get something done. And, that is sort of the recipe to move things forward and to really have some really good outcomes and really push therapy, especially in a geriatric realm forward.

One of the other things I think that we’re seeing more of is really social media. It’s really becoming a central piece of therapy in general, the therapy community: getting people moving towards a common cause, disseminating information things like journal articles that used to be sort of hard to come across to spend a lot of time looking for them. Now, they’re sort of there on people’s Twitter feeds and there are individuals, there are groups, there is the CSM Twitter handle and other social media as well, not just Twitter.

But, all of that is really growing and really making a positive impact on the profession. I think revolutionizing what we do, making it more attainable… and not just for us I think for the end user as well.

People out there looking for physical therapy services looking to get the benefits of what we bring to the table. I think we’re out there talking about it more, and I think people are able to see it. People are able to interact with it. It doesn’t seem as foreign and as medically-based at times. I think people think they can get to it and get to it quickly. And, I think that’s really important.

There were almost 9,000 tweets sent during CSM this year over a couple of days which is almost 100 per hour which is pretty insane. So there that piece of it as well.

I think another thing that I noticed, and it sort of goes along with these other themes as well, is just the new professionals that we have coming into the therapy profession. You know, they all have their DPT at this point. They’re very intelligent. They’re engaged. They’re motivated. And, they really want to get involved in things outside of the classroom, and you’re seeing it.

The student numbers at CSM are growing. The number of posters from students is growing. Their level of involvement and advocacy, and again, things outside of the classroom is really going through the roof and you’re really starting to see it. You’re starting to see almost these sort of age classes and therapy starting to develop. You’ve got the people that have been doing it for a while that have that have driven us to where we are now that are researching and have elevated practice.

And then, you’ve got people that have been out maybe 10 or 15 years that are starting to kind of take those leadership roles and move into some of the academic type things. Then, you’ve got the people that are either in school or just came out of school recently that are right there — involved and really making things happen in actually new and innovative ways which sort of also goes back to the whole social media push as well. And I think, it’s much needed and it’s getting us a little bit more cutting edge in not just the treatment we provide, but I think, how we present ourselves.

And one of the other things that I noticed and this is something I see every year and I think I’m in a unique position to see it because I go every year is clinical representation of FOX, but more and more every year, I’m seeing the FOX standard of care for the geriatric older adult on display. It’s growing. It’s becoming more recognized.

So this year, we had 30 people attend CSM from FOX, most of which are clinicians. We had Jimmy McKay of the PT Pintcast who now does FOXcast PT. He was there interviewing industry leaders. We had multiple posters presented this year. We had our founder and CEO Dr. Tim Fox sat on that panel along with some other really heavy hitters in the geriatric realm that I think was really helpful and how we can change our outlook practice and move forward. I had the unique opportunity and was very thankful for to present with Dr. Carole Lewis on a project that she’s working on: the moving target screen.

So we have a lot more presentation influence, a lot more sort of involvement in the programming that goes on at CSM, and it continues to grow. And I think, the other really big thing, too, is just our dedication to specialty certification. ‘.

We had 23 new GCSs this year in the practice, 18 of which actually attended CSM, walked in this ceremony, were at the breakfast, and a number of them are actually starting to get involved now in the Academy of Geriatric Physical Therapy.

So we as a practice sort of have this same phenomenon happening where we’ve got people coming in that are relatively new to the practice getting involved, getting specialized, maybe doing residency programs, and really injecting themselves into geriatric rehab and we’re helping to shape where it’s going. I think we’ve shaped where it has been to a degree through our innovative modeling and I think we’re at the forefront of helping it move forward and shaping what we do in the next five to 10 years as well to really help the older adult.

So, those are my big takeaways from CSM and I hope to see you there next year.