E828 | Important Trends In Physical Therapy WIth Yves Gege

AI, Accountability & The Future of Physical Therapy

In this episode of the PT Entrepreneur Podcast, Doc Danny and Yves Gege dive into how AI is shaking up the healthcare world—and what that means for physical therapists. From AI-driven documentation tools to the cultural shift toward longevity and wellness, they break down the macro trends shaping the future of private practice.

Whether you're a clinic owner or just getting started, this conversation sheds light on how to stay relevant, efficient, and in demand.

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🎯 What They Covered:

• AI is here—and it's replacing admin-heavy roles fast. But manual, movement-based care? That’s not going anywhere.

• Tools like Claire AI are saving PTs an hour a day in documentation time—freeing up time to focus on what matters most: patient care.

• Burnout is real, and most young PTs aren’t willing to work in mills or basements anymore. They're choosing autonomy and impact.

• High-accountability practices win. Cookie-cutter care plans and auto-generated protocols aren’t enough—people want connection.

• Cultural shifts matter—more people are wearing fitness trackers, rucking, joining health-focused communities, and cutting alcohol. They're hungry for expert guidance.

• Performance-based PTs are leading the charge, blending movement, lifestyle coaching, and expert rehab.

• Practice laws still matter. Direct access limitations are frustrating—but the trend is slowly improving.

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💡 Key Takeaways

“One hour a day saved is 20 hours a month. That’s almost an entire day of your life you get back—just by changing how you document.”

“We’re not just PTs anymore—we’re human body consultants who can coach, program, and guide long-term transformation.”

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🧠 Tips for Future-Proofing Your Practice

• Embrace AI tools—especially for time-sucking tasks like note-taking.

• Build deeper relationships with your patients. Know their names. Know their goals.

• Educate your community. Help them understand the true value of working with you versus an insurance clinic.

• Sell the transformation—not the technique.

• Build or join local health communities (run clubs, ruck groups, workshops).

• Don’t be afraid to pivot. Burnout doesn’t have to be the norm.

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🔗 Helpful Links

• PT Biz: www.physicaltherapybiz.com

• Book a free strategy call: Discovery Call Scheduler

• Claire AI (AI-powered documentation tool): www.meetclaire.ai

• YouTube channel: @ptbiz

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Final Thoughts

AI isn't coming—it's already here. But it won’t replace human connection. If you're a performance-based PT who’s deeply invested in your patients, the future is bright. Tools like Claire can help you reclaim time and improve care. Cultural trends are swinging in our favor. And the demand for trusted, movement-based providers is growing fast.

The key? Stay adaptable. Stay focused on outcomes. And don’t wait for the system to change—build the kind of practice people are already looking for.

Do you enjoy the podcast?  If so, leave us a 5-star review on iTunes and tell a friend to do the same!

Ready to elevate your practice? Book a call at the link below with one of our expert consultants today and start your journey to delivering unparalleled physical therapy.

Podcast Transcript

Danny: [00:00:00] Hey, Danny Matta here, founder PT Biz with my business partner Yves Gigi. We're gonna dive into some trends in the cash pay, uh, cash pay and the, uh, hybrid world that we're seeing, because one of the things that we like to do on an ongoing basis is get together and have these discussions on what we're seeing from like a 30,000 foot view.

And, uh, you know, it's, it's, it's cool to kind of just like see where the profession is trending, um, and to, to. Share that with everyone that listens to this because you might just be running one business, right? We get a chance to now see hundreds of businesses across the country and uh, and see these sort of macro trends, which is cool to be able to share that as well as help you kind of skate where the puck is going, is the goal, uh, when we share these things.

So first of all, um, Yves. We just watched, um, a couple videos of AI generated babies. Uh, there are comedians having conversations. The world is changing rapidly. Uh, you know, so it's great to, [00:01:00] to jump on and, and have these conversations about what's, what's going on. But it's a crazy world, man. Like things are just like totally nuts.

Yves: Um, I can't wait to f get an AI generated baby of the both of us doing this podcast. Yeah. I feel like that's a new goal of mine is to make that happen. I don't know how, but we're gonna figure it out.

Danny: Oh, we could totally figure that out. I mean, there's no, no doubt about that. Like, it's, it's right around the corner.

Um, and, you know, this is actually a great place for us to start because, you know, I feel like one of, one of the things that we're seeing more than anything, uh, is I. AI is starting to intertwine with healthcare and, and, uh, we're starting to get some really interesting data back on what it's helping with, what it's not really able to do much with, uh, and, and where it's gonna be utilized within the profession.

And before we dive into that, we will share one thing. I'm a family member that works for Microsoft and she works [00:02:00] on the, um, it's like the consulting implementation side of things. So she's like a sales director for, uh, for one of the teams that, that works, uh, works on, you know, implementing one of the applications they have.

It's a huge company, but I just saw her yesterday and one of the things that she told me that was interesting was, uh, number one, they just had like 10,000 people laid off. And the reason for it was, uh, the development of ai. It being not as necessary to have as many, they call 'em full-time employees, FTEs.

So that's people, right? So it's just human beings. And here's what's happening. As they submit a consulting contract, there's a certain number of people that are real people, and there's a certain number of AI agents that work alongside those, uh, people to make them more efficient and. She said it's somewhere in the range of like 20 to 25% of the people that they're, uh, like submitting contracts for that are agents now and not people.

So it's slowly shifted from a hundred percent [00:03:00] to now it's 75%. But what's crazy is the, the people that are the consultants, uh, for that implementation are training the agents to be more efficient with them. And slowly that's eroding the number of real people. So, and even in the, in, in the sales pipeline for them.

All of the setting, qualifying, all these things that, that used to be done by people are now, a lot of it's being offset by ai. And then the human is basically finishing the deal, right? Having the, the final discussion, maintaining that relationship, things like that. So, so when we look at like one of the biggest companies in the world.

It's pretty, it's pretty interesting to extrapolate their leading edge, right? Giant company. They're developing a lot of this and it will trickle down eventually. It, it's not gonna happen like anytime soon, I don't think. But when you see things like that, you, it's easy to kind of start to extrapolate that into, okay, well what are these other industries gonna look like?

What can they use those for? And when we look at it with healthcare in particular, it's mundane tasks, right? It's, it's administrative things. It's things that are redundant, [00:04:00] repetitive, and uh, those are the ones that honestly. Also burn people out the most. So it's very interesting to kind of see what, uh, the trends are.

And in a lot of ways for our profession, it's really positive because even she said, she was like, it'd be a good time to be a physical therapist because can't really offset that with AI very easily. Uh, it's very person to person, hands on, and she's right. It's actually fantastic job security. If you're listening to this, um, you're, you're in a pretty good spot.

Yves: So much to, I feel like unpack just in all of that. Um, I think AI is no doubt gonna disrupt so many jobs, right? Like we're, we're seeing it. I've got a, um, uh. My brother-in-law's husband works for like this new tech company and he's like, every single person within the last three months is required to learn ai.

It has some sort of AI agent working with them. You know, there's just so many examples. Like there's also a guy who's kind of in [00:05:00] the coaching space, Cole Gordon. We know him, but. Somebody else may not, right? Like he's kind of a big, um, coaches. Coaches basically. And, um, I saw some of his ads and it's all trying to help CPAs and bookkeepers because they're about to lose their jobs.

So like it's this big ad that just says, AI's gonna replace you, do this before you get replaced. So it mean, I think it's happening almost at an alarming rate like we had. Maybe we didn't, 'cause I wasn't in business then, but I feel like we had ti like time to kinda learn the internet and like iPhones and apps, like those things slowly came and AI was just like, all of a sudden I feel like I woke up and AI was here and just like every week I know you're seeing this, there's something new happening, there's a new kind of agent and it's just like I'm having trouble, uh, keeping up.

You know, it could be a full-time job just learning what AI is doing and how much is changing every single day.

Danny: Dude, a hundred percent. I mean, it's overwhelming. And I think this is where, what's interesting is like, she's kind of the tail end of her career. So I mean, she, she's kind of like, [00:06:00] well, it's gonna replace people.

It's gonna, maybe it replaces my job, don't really care. She's probably got a couple years left and she's gonna retire. Like she's, she's, uh, she, she's towards that, that part of her career. Um, but yeah, I mean, if you think of, if you think of tasks that are somewhat redundant. And, and, um, administrative clerical in nature that don't involve a human to human touchpoint that is prime, uh, example of disruption through a.

Artificial intelligence and, and it's not like it hasn't kind of already happened to some degree. Like we both remember going from writing paper notes to writing notes, uh, in A EMR. Like I actually, I remember whenever I had spent my year internship when I was at Baylor, I. I was at Texas Physical Therapy Specialists in New Braunfels, Texas, and I freaking remember, we used to have, you know, notebook, like these, like notebooks that we'd have to write in and they would storm in filing [00:07:00] cabinets.

And I mean, the thing of the amount of faxing that had to be done, the, the challenge of like reorganizing that, the fact that it had to have like two locks to be HIPAA compliant, right? Like can just go in there and steal all this shit. Um, and, but the, the, the tech transition, the learning a new piece of software was so.

Challenging for some of the providers we had, especially, and I hate to say it because I'm in this age group now, like the older providers. Yep. They, I thought they were gonna quit. Like some of them were just like, I'm done. I can't be a physical therapist anymore because I can't write, write on paper. And, but the amount of time that it's saved and billing and in, uh, pa patient continuity, uh, across the board and, uh, just effectiveness of, of being able to pull notes for things like, um, let's, let's say there was a lawsuit and I've had this happen where I've been sequestered for my notes and.

Could you imagine paper having to like go and you gotta find those, you gotta like, make copies of it. You gotta fax it to the who, you know, the attorney group, whatever. And a lot of, a lot of that's completely gone, right? So, [00:08:00] um, but, but the transition was super, super challenging. So I think there are technological cha uh, changes that have happened that we've seen firsthand.

Um, yep. But. But I don't, I don't know. I, I'm not sure if I can say that there were as many positions that were being, uh, you know, removed and replaced by tools that can do what they're doing better, cheaper, faster. Um, you know, as quickly as I've seen in the last few years, uh, that we've been using different artificial intelligence tools.

Yves: Yeah, I feel like ever since. Things went to electronic EMR, um, and maybe it's just coincidental, but the administrative side of healthcare has ballooned, right? Like yes, administrative staff. I needed, when I ran insurance based practice, I forgot the exact ratio, but it was like three to four to one, you know, where you needed a billing, an admin typically, and then like a support staff just for like essentially one provider.

It. [00:09:00] I guess most likely gonna happen is hopefully that stuff will become essentially way more efficient, um, because it's efficient right now, you know, we're seeing too. To go back to that EMR part, just like what you noticed, it was so painful, if you remember, it was required, I think what they had to do to get us to change, at least our, the practice owner, which was just a small private practice here.

The only reason he changed is 'cause they were, they physically had to, they were like, became a law and sort of like, I guess I'll do this now. You know? So I'm wondering, you know, will that happen to healthcare now? Like, are we just so in our own rut that we're not going to use this stuff? I don't think that's true because we are so.

Burnt out. We are really frustrated with kind of taking notes. We're all, we don't wanna do the, we don't wanna like just use our craft and I think AI is gonna allow us to do that. Um, and then as on the business owner side also gonna allow us to be more profitable, [00:10:00] more efficient, and, you know, focus on things we want to.

So, uh, I think. It's, we're gonna more easily adapt this because, because you also see it too, like everyone from private equity, from technology, they're really trying to attack healthcare. Right. Like on all angles. If it's coming to pharmaceuticals, when it's coming to, you know, primary care when it's coming Yeah.

To EMRs physical therapy. So, um, I think we're primed for like a complete retooling and, um, some efficiency on our side. I think AI is perfect.

Danny: I don't think they have a choice. And esp, I mean we can you talk about healthcare in general, but like, uh, just when you look at physical therapy, right? And you look at reimbursement rates.

They've gone down year over year, right? Unless you're, unless you're a really big organization and you can throw your weight around and get these contracts negotiated in your, in your favor, um, or you partner with the hospital system or something like that, that has, has better reimbursements, well, you're, you, you don't have a choice by the see more volume.

Or to, to, to go the hybrid route. Like, like what we end up working with so many [00:11:00] people on, which is, alright, we're cutting these insurances. Maybe keep these, 'cause the volume and its decent pay rates, but you gotta get your average visit rates up and you need to be more efficient with these things. And the administrative side is, is less so you don't have as much of a burden there.

So you can improve profit margins with that. But the. Not everybody's gonna do that. And if there's administrative burden in place and you can remove that and you can improve efficiency in the business, you know, maybe that changes the net profit by 5% or something being like, you know, realistic, that that's potentially possible.

Um. That's a meaningful difference for a lot of businesses. That's a, it's a huge difference. So like I see, I see why people will do that. And healthcare is notoriously slow for, for, um, you know, changing, uh, to technology. Like dude in the, in the army, we are still on the, the das system. Like the, the, it's, it's like if you want to go in and do certain things in the records.

And anybody that's, that's listening to this that has been in the government system, I, and I think the VA [00:12:00] may be on this as well. You go to like a blinking cursor like you would see on like a old, old school Mac. Yeah. And you have to prompt like numbers, and then it goes through the stuff and you're like, what in the hell is this thing doing?

You know? But it's so ingrained into the system. I don't even know if they could change it now if they wanted to. Uh, and, and it's, and everything is layered on top of that. Like, so there's certain things like if I wanted to order. Um, you know, certain like medications or if I wanna order certain, uh, images and stuff like where I have to look certain things up, I'd have to go to this other system that was so just archaic, uh, that, uh, that I had to do it.

And, um, you know, so I, I think we're very slow to change and I. There's plenty of places though, where it could be very beneficial. Probably more so in the primary care standpoint, right? Where you can get, like there's a lot of people that don't live near hospitals or, you know, maybe they have to drive like pretty far and they're overwhelmed.

Um, you know, and they don't, they don't have as much availability. Well, okay, cool. Now you can have these portals that can generally triage people, uh, and really [00:13:00] help with maybe some of the overwhelm that shouldn't be there. So I do, I do think there's a lot of. Potentially really important benefits, uh, from these types of tools in our profession.

I think you can do some digital care, uh, simple stuff. Maybe it's management of postoperative care and things like that at a certain stage where it's, it's, uh, unnecessary to come in, maybe, uh, hands-on or, or it's, they don't have like these. Extreme goals of getting back to, you know, higher level activities.

Like they just want to walk around, um, and what's them doing? Nothing. Or them, you know, doing something that's like templated and it's like something they can go back and forth with. That's more of like a chat bot. It's better than nothing. So, you know, I do think that there's, there's some things happening there, but the, the bigger thing that I see is, and you sent this to me yesterday.

It was an article looking at AI in healthcare, and they were specifically looking at, um, documentation tools, which like, we know very well, we developed one. Uh, you know, go, go to meet claire.ai if you wanna see what we've done with this, where it can listen. They call it like an ambient [00:14:00] scribe. It listens to your interaction, it writes your note for you.

And what was really cool was the study looked at a hospital. They had like 600 physicians use this. And the biggest thing that stuck out to me was the patient satisfaction numbers went up and the biggest thing that changed was that they felt like the doctor was listening to them. Yeah. Like, fucking listen to that for a second.

How many times have you gone to a hospital and the provider's trying to diligently type shit up while they're trying to tell you about what's wrong with them and it feels like they're not connecting with you? I've been there myself, like in order for me to catch up on my notes and not be stuck in the office for who knows how long after a long day of seeding patience, you don't have a choice but to try to do that along the way and then catch up over lunch and.

But the patient feels the same thing and they feel disconnected from you. So if you can improve outcomes, decrease burnout because you're saving something an hour a day of writing notes and like you're, you have higher, you know, patient, uh, satisfaction scores, like that's a complete win. Just as a simple example of where AI fits really well.

[00:15:00] Uh, and, and obviously it's still early stages, but like that's just something that's a absolute home run.

Yves: Yeah, and it's just getting started, you know, like what we've seen with Claire. It is mind blowing how accurate it is and how much it puts those things together for you. Like I think the biggest challenge will be, uh, kind of trust and reliability when it comes to these tools.

Right. But what we've seen so far, you know, when I tested and we tested and made to move, every person seems to be like. Wow. It picked everything up that it was supposed to pick up and it put it in a way that I would've put it, you know, and I think that will probably be the biggest challenge. I think a lot of people are scared, um, of technology and you know, when they're scared, they're like, well, I'm just not gonna do this.

I'm not gonna learn it at all. And. Unfortunately, I don't think there'll be a choice, right? Like it's going to overtake so many different things, and healthcare, um, is not gonna be absent from it. And the people that are gonna do really well, we know this, right? Like we, we [00:16:00] kinda have to be the tip of the spear, right?

Like we're, we're trying to teach other clinicians. So like, we're gonna always talk about CRMs, we're gonna talk about Mark. Like all that stuff is involved technology. And, you know, there's not gonna be any hiding from this, right? And one hour that doesn't sound that much, one hour a day. But like extrapolate that over a month, over a quarter, over a year, right?

Like the amount of time that you're gonna save and frustration is gonna be massive. And don't let just the idea of learning something new, a new tool stop you from saving the amount of money because you know, it's exactly what happened when we talked about, when you went from writing notes to electronically, it was really difficult to learn a new tool.

But now we couldn't imagine. Not using it. You know, there, there would be no way we could go back to handwritten notes at this point. It's just too efficient, you know, basically it's writing our note, you know, EMR gotta the point where it was right, it was just like copy and paste and writing the note for you.

It wasn't like that at the beginning, but um, you know, it got better and better and, and AA is not gonna be any different. You know, we're gonna see [00:17:00] complete full eye AI agents helping healthcare providers from end to end. I mean, it's going to happen.

Danny: Oh, for sure. Yeah, absolutely. And it's, well, it's becoming more simplified too, to use, right?

And, and, um, I mean, I'll give you a good example, right? Like I, I took my daughter and her friend to the grocery store to buy some stuff for her. One of their other friends, surprise birthday parties. Um. Now, they didn't tell me that I was paying for it. They, they tricked me when we got up to the, to the register and they were like, oh, we'll pay you back.

Yeah, right. Uh, so anyway, it was $18 and there's three of them. They're throwing the surprise party for this fourth girl and her friend goes, man, what is eight? Uh, or. Not 18 divided. Yeah. What's 18 divided by three is what she said. You know, and it's like not a round number. Right? Um, and so what would I do?

I would pull my phone out, I [00:18:00] would pull the calculator up, I would type in 18 divided by three, and then I would get the, the number right? Or a friend just use, uses her watch. She's like, Hey Siri, what's 18 divided by three? And it just says, you know, six point, whatever, you know, and, uh, or, or five points on or whatever it was.

And. I've noticed the same thing with my son. I've noticed the same thing with all their friends. Like it's typing slow. Using an interaction like that is slow. Searching for something traditionally is slow and uh, they trust it a lot more too. You know, like I don't even have Siri turn on my phone. I.

Because I don't trust it on, listen to me, uh, you know, like I just, or also it just screws shit up. Sometimes it hears me say something and I'm like, I didn't say Siri said something else. Right. So it's just like, it's, it's, it's frustrating. So I just turned off and they, it's the first thing that they use.

Right. So they are very, very enabled with that. And I have, uh, Ashley has two stepsisters that are, one is in her mid twenties and one is in college right now. She just turned [00:19:00] 21. Dude. It is a huge part of their day-to-day workflow. It's the first thing that they go to, and it's not a question of like, you know, what should I do for this?

Or it's, it's like, why would you not use this first? You know, like, this is just, it's, it's a part of everything that they do. School, personal life planning things, looking things up, you know, gathering information, developing things, like, it's just, it's a huge part of it. It's not going anywhere. What's happening is they're becoming more and more user friendly and, and, uh, the, the technological learning curve is lowering, which is allowing user adoption to have happen faster.

You know, you can just say something and it can transcribe and it goes straight into the, uh, into the tool much faster than typing. If you look at something like Claire, for instance. It's all, all you do is hit a button, it records it, it saves your note, you hit a second button to copy it, and then you paste it into whatever EMR you want.

There's no tech adoption there. There's literally nobody that like tech inept that they can't do it. [00:20:00] But yet what, what's, what's interesting is the, it's, it's like the, uh, the burden of change. Is needs to be overcome. Uh, and it and when with technology in healthcare, and I've noticed this myself, like my team trying to get me to use Slack for the first time, I was just like, dug in, dude.

It's like, no way. No way. Yeah. Just email me. And I couldn't imagine running everything through email right now instead of Slack for our company.

Yves: Oh my God, be impossible. Could you imagine?

Danny: Dude, but I was like the last one to finally come along and the only thing that got me was I wanted to participate in the team, like, uh, channel with like 20 gifts.

Yes. Yep. That's what got me to adopt it. So, so I get it. But please, I'm telling you, don't be that provider that is like, I do things this way. I've always done things this way. Especially when it comes to things like this that are like obviously a game changer if you save an hour a day. Times the days that you're working, let's call it [00:21:00] 20 hours in a month, would you rather type notes for 20 hours a month?

Like, think about that for a second. Like that's almost an entire 24 hour day that now you, you don't get that back all at once, but you get an hour each day of these things. And we know one of the biggest burnout. You know, factors is documentation. It's arduous. It's like you do it at the end of the day, you're doing it over your lunch break.

I mean, how many times do you eat freaking lunch for God's sakes? You know, when you're in a busy clinic, like rarely are you doing that while you're not like chewing on your sandwich while you're typing stuff up. Mm-hmm. You know? So it just creates a opportunity to take some of the mundane things away.

And I think this is actually a really positive thing of AI that we're gonna see in healthcare because we don't have to worry so much about it taking our job. If we're manual therapists and people want to deal with a human face-to-face, like. We're actually in a really unique place, I think to thrive with it and not be replaced by it.

Yeah.

Yves: I mean, I'm gonna say it especially, uh, performance-based cash PTs are leading into it, you know, like they're, people almost always come to us because they want human to human interaction and they want [00:22:00] somebody to help them, uh, look at their problem and listen to them. So the insulation behind that is huge.

Right? So we're a long way away from a, a robot. You know, human, a robot looking like a human and be able to replicate that like a long way away. Yeah. So I think the more we lean into that, just like you said, the more, um, we're gonna be insulated from this. I do think, and we're seeing it already, there's health insurances that are adopting, you know, uh, AI or, uh, virtual based, uh, put in a diagnosis and it spits out.

You know, uh, uh, program that they need to do to rehab, you know, their Achilles or whatever, right? Like, those things are coming out. So like you're gonna kind of see, which I just, I still hate saying it 'cause I'm, I'm a pt, right? Like the commodization,

Danny: be honest. What do you think the compliance of that actually is?

Like what percent. Compliance. If, if, if you're, let's say there's a hundred random patients and they just type into a prompt, they have Achilles problems and they've gotta go through that Achilles, like eccentric load [00:23:00] protocol specifically over the next, however many, you know, two, three months. How many of those a hundred people actually do it?

Two. Like, like with no, with no human guidance, with nobody building rapport with them about like why, with nobody holding them accountable. So, so even digitally, you know what, you know what, uh, digital accountability is a fucking notification that pops up on your phone. You know what I do? Ignore it. Delete, like, turn it off.

You know, like there's something that, that is gonna be so difficult and you're, yes, people, some people will do that, especially if they don't have any, you know, means to like go and get help. That could be a great option for them. But I'm, I just don't think the accountability, I don't think the compliance is actually gonna be that good.

Yves: Oh, I agree. But, so that's why it's no different, I think, than to some of these bigger physical therapy practices and the hospital, because are those people, like if a patient drops off, do they care? Do they follow up with them? Do they make sure that they come in and follow their plan of care? Probably not.

So it's really no. I mean, it is better. [00:24:00] Obviously seeing a human is gonna be way better than ai. But ultimately, uh. I think they're gonna get replaced by, it's a big percentage of them, but people like us where every patient matters, we follow up like crazy. We make sure they follow the plan. We leverage technology in order to, you know, make sure that they're doing their exercises and tweaking them even when they're not in the office.

Like there's so much that we can do and that's just gonna be become more and more. Ultimately more and more valuable. So I feel like we're just gonna see the separation between the two. It's gonna be kind of high end, high accountability, like you're talking about. And then some people who just like you know, say, all right, here's a plan.

You're probably not gonna follow it anyway. Um, 'cause the statistics on that are really bad. I found another article, same exact, uh, I may have sent it to you as well, I'm not sure, but like the compliance behind PT and physicians sending them is like. It's extremely low, like it was alarmingly low to even go, you know what I mean?

Yeah. To even just like follow through and go, which I thought was, which I thought was crazy, but again, another reason that what we're doing makes sense because we're not [00:25:00] a. Relying on the doctor to make the referral. We are following up with them like crazy, talking to their friends and family, going to workshops until they finally make their way into our office.

And we relentless about it. And that's what people are gonna need in order to, to get better. They're gonna need somebody who cares that much to get them in the office. And, you know, uh, that's why we're leaning into this so hard.

Danny: Well, I think the other trend for. These more movement-based, performance-based providers that want to really lean into, uh, more of sort of like a holistic approach to people.

Um, you know, really is, is more of sort of like the lifestyle medicine, um, trend. In fact, I was talking to, um, Kelly about this Kelly Ette, uh, last week. Uh, uh, they were at a lifestyle medicine conference at Stanford. Uh, they were presenting and he was like. Why am I up here? You know, it's just this, it's like, uh, there's with all these PhDs and shit like that from Sanford Medicine and with the, the funny thing is they do so much more of it than almost [00:26:00] anybody else that's presenting because like, that's just that they do that.

They work with real people all the time. They're not researching it. Like they're just actually working with people, helping them establish habits. And, you know, one of the things that he said to me that I, I thought was interesting and something that I've thought about for a long time in terms of, I just.

This is the way that I used to treat this is the way that a lot of people that we work with Treat is for. In order for them to solve an injury, they have to then also talk to them about these corresponding factors, uh, lifestyle factors of sleep, nutrition, stress management, uh, and movement that, that, and community that go in conjunction with how your body's gonna heal and how you feel.

And now you don't have the time to do that in a traditional setting, but people are shifting to this model because. Two things are happening. Physicians are not wanting to work in a reactive manner. My sister-in-law, who's a badass nurse practitioner, opened her own functional med practice in Baltimore because of, one of the big reasons was at Shock Trauma Hospital, where she was at, which is a great hospital doing awesome stuff.

She just couldn't make changes with people that she wanted to see that would [00:27:00] stop them from getting there in the first place. And that's very frustrating for a lot of providers. For us, uh, we have the time to work with people and have these conversations. They're interested in learning about it because.

There's, there's not only just providers that are shifting this direction, there's people that are looking for an alternative. And it, there's a lot of people making a lot of money off of this too, in a lot of like weird shit that is completely, uh, you know, unfounded in terms of, there's no, there's no like, scientific basis for this.

And it is funny to talk to her about this or talk to my friends that are like legitimate physicians that happen to be in functional medicine or lifestyle medicine. And the people that are making the most money off of this typically have, like, they're just, they're just selling like. Crazy stuff for extreme amounts of money that's un, you know, really has limited to no research to back it up.

Uh, but so it swings really far one direction, but I think what will happen is it'll come back to, uh, a reasonable place where it's like, yes, okay, this is very important. And no, you don't have to take a pill for everything. Uh, and, but you need to work with somebody who's gonna help you establish long-term habitual changes.[00:28:00]

What a great place for us to fit in as the clinicians that have number one, just help somebody to get over an injury. Had these surface level conversations with them about, you know, what they need to do from the, this, the, the other factors, sleep, nutrition, you know, stress management, things like that. And then be able to work with them and be this sort of like human body consultants to help them get to whatever the next, you know, phase of their health and wellness is.

Because we have trust, accountability, uh, we have the knowledge to be able to, and some of you maybe don't yet and need to learn more about some of these factors, but it's, it's a great place to be a lifelong learner. There's so much to do. You're not replacing anybody's. Physician, what you basically are becoming is a very, very, like a heavily educated health coach that happens to also be able to use your hands to help with pain symptoms and understands programming.

Like a strength coach, like, I don't even know, like the best combination described it as, it's like this weird, unique hybrid that is becoming way more sought after and people are looking for these all across the country and it's, we're just, we are ahead of the curve and, and we didn't even know this is just how we thought we should work with [00:29:00] people.

Yves: Yeah, I mean, you could go back to our earlier podcast. We've been having this exact conversation for a long time, and I feel like, uh, probably for the first time I, you know, we, I specifically, um, I. Was on a trend before it actually happened. You know, like we timed it perfectly. Like we got into Apple before the iPhone was even a thing because we were like this, like this makes sense to us.

This is what we wanna provide for people. Let's do this. And when we first started. Um, you know, you have this, the version of marketing, you have to be like problem aware and then solution aware. And I feel like when we first started practices, we had to get people to realize that this is a problem. You need to make these changes.

And by the way, the solution is come to physical therapy and I'm gonna be the one that needs. Now people already understand that there's a problem, like, and a perfect example is I walk around and you know this too, I walk around or I drive around mine. Neighborhood, Daniel Island. And I've never [00:30:00] seen more people rocking in my entire life.

You know, weighted vests on, like never in in ever, and people wearing wearables, right? And so like this trend is just like that wa that wasn't happening when we started our practice. Like those things, nobody cared what longevity was. You know, wellness was this like a meditation. There weren't these things that people talked about.

So now. They're everywhere. And like you said, we're almost swinging almost too far where people are like, you know, they're still trying to find easy fixes ultimately. But I think most people get, they're like, all right, I need to train and I need to take care of myself. I probably can't do it on my own. I need, I won't, you know, I wanna find also a medical professional I can trust to do this.

And we've been saying it for years. PTs are the, you know, and. Rehab performance clinicians are the perfect people positioned for this specific thing. So like, again, been saying it for five years, it's the perfect time to become a performance pt. Like it's, it still is. I don't see the trend changing anytime soon.

Danny: Dude, you're so right about the difference in culture. I [00:31:00] mean, the guy that I, the guy that I train with, uh, I, he's been my training partner now, like. Consistent as could be between six o'clock in the morning, every single, every day during the week. And every, every Wednesday we, we rock. So, and this is nothing new to me.

I, this is just what we did on like Thursdays when I was in the Army, and I didn't do it for a long time after I got out because I didn't actually really like it that much. Like it's just, and now granted I don't wear as much weight and I don't go as far so. It is far better when you're going like four miles with 30 pounds than when you're going like, you know, eight miles with like 50 pounds or 60 pounds or whatever.

Right. Or, or even maybe even further on some days. And it just, like, it beats you up if you, if you go like really far. But obviously it's a very different situation. And, uh, so now on Wednesday mornings, it's it, we have anywhere between six and 12 people that'll come out and we actually at this point have to stop telling other people about it because.

I think that if we really just like, yo, hey, come out, whatever, we'd have 20 something people out and it would become, uh, problematic for getting across streets and stuff [00:32:00] and uh, you know, so, but people were interested in, uh, a couple things. Number one, health and wellness. They want to, they like, they want to get healthier.

They wanna move. It's a low barrier. Uh, for a lot of folks, I'd just have to walk maybe a little bit of weight. Even if you don't want to carry weight, we don't care. Just get out there and walk around. Um, we have a hilly neighborhood in this. In four miles, we'll do 650 to 700, uh, feet of elevation gain, which is like a.

You know, a little bit of a hike, uh, for a lot of people, right? Like it's for sure. It's, it's not insignificant amount of elevations, so you get your heart rate up. It's great zone two training, but the amount of people that show up that we work with now are that, that just come out to rock is I. Yeah, like they have an AA ring, they have a whoop on, they're tracking their, everything on their, on their Apple watch.

You know, they're, uh, they're, they're asking me questions about like supplements and sleep hacks and stuff. I'm like, this is independent. I'm not even doing this shit for a living anymore. And they just wanna know. And so I, I think there's been a shift in the. [00:33:00] The culture of people wanting to be healthier and a lot of them have completely stopped drinking, which is interesting.

Uh, and that was not the case for most of my life that I can remember. And so there's definitely health trends that are going that direction and people are looking for vetted information with providers they can trust. That is a perfect place for us to be. And I completely agree with you. Like we. We're in a place where I think it's a sweet spot between what people are looking for and what we want them to do, which hasn't always been the case.

We'd have to like talk them into, Hey, why don't you sleep a little bit more? Maybe you shouldn't drink so much. You know, like now they're like looking for it and, and, uh, I think that that niche in particular, I. Explodes over the next, you know, five, 10 years, 10 years in not just our profession, but many different subsets around that.

Um, and, uh, and, and I think it's a very healthy trend, to be honest with you, from a population standpoint for, lemme, lemme put it this way. It's a healthy trend for people that have the disposable means to do so. I think like that is the other thing we have to keep in [00:34:00] mind is just like the lifestyle medicine approach is cool if you're not poor.

And if, and if you are, then there's really like. That, that is not even infiltrating them, uh uh, in any way. Right? Because one of the guys that we rock with, he's a pastor and he runs a, he runs a church and he primarily just works with like, you know, homeless, uh, homeless men, women, um, you know, soup kitchen, kind of, you know, just like food banks.

And he's like, these people need to eat better and they need to move more. And I'm like, yeah, dude, for sure. But like, they're just trying to get shelter. So it's not really a problem for 'em. So I think there's like a big chunk of the population this isn't even close to, but there's a middle class to upper middle class, you know, more affluent population that this is a, a huge emphasis for them because they wanna live longer and they wanna be able to like, you know, enjoy the world.

Yves: Yeah, and I think the other thing people are craving almost to like circle back to some of the AI stuff too, is that sense of community as well, right? Yes. And that community also being intertwined with being healthy. Like I've just seen this explosion, you know, we open [00:35:00] office, I. Uh, in Charlotte, the amount of run clubs that exist in that area is like mind blowing.

Even here in Charleston, there's like so many, right? And just like, yeah, you started basically, essentially you started a rock club and you didn't even know it. And I'm like, what physical therapy practice, you know, shouldn't probably start a little rock club of their own, be a great way to like build community.

So I think people are now looking for these kind of health, uh, communities. Um, you know, just think of pickleball, the explosion of that, right? Like that's just like, it's easy. It's. Great way to be active. There's more people now playing. I, I don't know if the statistics right, but somebody told me this, more people playing pickleball for their business meetings than golf than ever before.

And like pickleball is way more active. I mean, play a little singles pickleball, we know, but like even doubles, like it's pretty active, you know? And so, um, I. I just, man, I love the trend ultimately. Um, and I think it's really good for, honestly, the culture in America and the world, period. But ultimately, uh, also really, really good for what we're trying to provide.

[00:36:00] Um, and just make it easier, uh, for some of these PTs who just like I. They don't wanna work at a mill. They don't wanna just like have these same conversations. Like they wanna, they want to go a little deeper and you can't do that typically in a hospital. You can't do that if you work at some of these big mill clinics.

But you can do that at performance based and hybrid clinics. Like that's, yeah. You know, it's cool,

Danny: man. It's like what? You know, when I, when I. When I came outta school, the only thing that really existed that was in this sort of functional realm was the F-M-S-S-F-M-A sort of approach, like the gray cook. I mean, there were other things, they just weren't on my radar, right?

Like there's plenty of other things you could say. Obviously they weren't the only ones, but they were, they were the most prevalent ones that I was aware of. I learned, I remember learning the FMS. This is actually crazy. Johnny Owens, who has Owens Recovery Science with like the blood flow pressure cuffs.

He, uh, was like one of our, I guess we consider like adjunct faculty. He was doing limb salvage rehab, um, training with people that had, you know, mostly [00:37:00] blast gunshot wound injuries that were, um, you know, they had some sort of, uh, they hadn't lost their leg, but they, they had some sort of, you know, uh, limb salvage surgery and maybe they had nerve damage or muscle damage or.

They were doing crazy shit like putting these stem cell packets that looked like decks of cards into people's, like, uh, you know, in, into their muscles to help regrow the capacity to produce force. Like just wild shit, right? And, but he was using the FMS to test and progress people that were limb salvage patients and regressing it all the way down.

But then he had these very, very specific protocols of when he would progress people based on. Ga, a gamut of tests with both FMS, isokinetic testing, lots of things, and I'd never seen anybody do this shit before, ever. Like I was completely. Overwhelmed. I remember just like, I, I was there for a week with him and I was just like, what in the hell did just happen to me?

Nobody [00:38:00] told me anything about this. Right? Like, nothing. And I couldn't like, learn enough about it from him. I ended up getting very, you know, fortunate to be able to do my research at the place where he was working a lot. So I, I had a chance to like shadow a lot of what he was doing and I just felt like.

Someone's gotta teach me this. Where did you learn this? You know? And then it was like, okay, cool. Go to an FMS course. And then it's like confusing. 'cause it it's, you know, it's two days or whatever. And. We're trying to apply it to patients and it doesn't really work that well in a clinical setting, but like, that's the beginning of, of that.

And then you, you know, you start seeing like, well now I have to learn about kettlebells. I have to learn about strength and conditioning. I have to, you know, uh, throw CrossFit in there back in the day with some of the things that they were doing, Olympic lifting and like all these things that are so much to learn, but all of it sort of whittles down to the same core concepts of just getting people to.

Live a healthier life, move more, you know, enjoy the, enjoy the, uh, community of people around them, which I think is massively important and underrated. Uh, you know, just from a, from a quality life standpoint, from a track, somebody's HRV, whenever they're around community more versus sitting by [00:39:00] themself, I promise you it's gonna be meaningfully higher when they have social interactions that are, that are positive and like these are things that.

I don't actually know if you're teaching this in school. You know, like there's, to my understanding, and this is what my school was, we taught to the test, we gotta pass the test. They cared all about the federal exam. That was it. Right? Which is cool. We gotta pass that. But there's so much more there and it's so exciting to think of like, uh, the, the people that are coming in the profession and if you're listening to this and you're like a student or you just got, got going.

What an awesome time to be in people. Shit on the PT profession constantly. And it's so annoying to me because it's like they just don't see what we see. Or maybe they function in a different part of the profession. I'm not sure. But man, like what a great time to come in. The profession I wish I had was just coming into the profession because it's, it's, it's moving in such a cool direction and we have an opportunity to really make these, build these businesses around.

Uh, you know what, how we really feel like people should be, should be worked with. And they're growing and they're, and they're scalable and you know, and they're not just a lifestyle business like we thought they would [00:40:00] be whenever we started ours.

Yves: Yeah. And I think people are. People thought in the beginning, or at least maybe even thinking now that the way we were gonna improve our profession was to, um, you know, level up, you know, go from master's to doctorate and keep moving forward that way, and that we were gonna lobby and then eventually, hopefully we're gonna.

Be able to get more reimbursement at this point. You know, we know, uh, and maybe I'm wrong, maybe I'm wrong, but we've talked to some people who, who are in these conversations and that's not gonna change. Right? And so, and that hasn't changed. So, okay, what is the next kind of recourse? And the next recourse, unfortunately, has been that there's less physical therapists than ever because they're basically getting burnt out and they're leaving the profession.

And most. Physical therapists who are coming in or coming up are not going to work, especially in the outpatient world for a hospital or for a mill clinic. They're gonna either start their own, or if they have some availability, they're gonna go find a [00:41:00] performance space practice. And so the profession is going to have to adapt.

Like there's no, you know, because. People aren't even gonna take those jobs, which I think, I'm sure there's a lot of people are like, man, that's frustrating. But I think that's great. It's like, it's a way we're finally just starting to advocate for ourselves. We're not gonna be able to lobby Blue Cross Blue Shield, you know, and UnitedHealthcare to be like, no, I don't want $70.

You know, untimed, I'm, you know, they're not gonna change that. This is the way that we it's gonna change, is that we're gonna just have to advocate for ourselves and, um. At this point, you know, students are probably frustrated and, uh, not willing to go this other route. And so they're gonna go this route and there's a shift happening, uh, across the board and, and that that's not changing either anytime soon, which is, you know, in my opinion.

Awesome. You know, like, let's take control of our own hands just like we did. You know, ultimately we were frustrated and say like, I can't do it this way. I've gotta do it this way. Let's start something from scratch. And, um, you know, here we [00:42:00] are.

Danny: Yeah. You know, I mean, it, it's, it's interesting because it just comes, it is supply and demand basically is what happens.

So, and I, I'll, I'll, I'll give you a good example. When I was a, when I was in school, um, part of what we did for our rotations is, uh, we had to spend, um, you know, a couple weeks at a VA hospital. So, I dunno how much time you've ever spent in a VA hospital, but it is. Not the most pleasant place in the world.

And, um, it is, you know, it's a, it's a hospital. The clinic that I was in was in the basement. There was no natural light, uh, linoleum and fluorescent, you know, everywhere. And I was, I was there with another person I went to school with. Right. So we're, we're there active duty uniforms, right? Like in the va walking in day one, we've got, uh.

We're just so excited to not be in class. And I think we were there for two or three weeks [00:43:00] after the first week. I remember sitting down for lunch with this guy and, uh, we, we start this, we basically started this game that was like, how much would they have to pay you to work? Here was the game, right? And.

The number got higher and higher the longer we stayed there because it was just a tough place to work. It was, uh, like a, it wasn't what we wanted to do the, in the environment. Just imagine sitting in a basement, you know, with no natural light, with, uh. Just, just, I mean, a lot of, a lot of the things that were coming in, it's a challenging group to work with sometimes because there's a lot of self-harm in terms of like, just a lot of alcoholism, a lot of, uh, just mental health issues that lead to, you know, people not really being able to, um, function in society really well.

There's plenty of people that are not that case as well, but, um, and then you also get, you also get people that in some cases. They want to change their rating, they want to improve their rating. So they'll have things that they want [00:44:00] documented that are getting worse. And, um, I mean, dude, it's just like, like I've seen people tell me stuff that's wrong with them and, you know, sit down in a cafeteria and overhear them talking about how they're gonna get a hundred percent disability and get a power wheelchair.

And the best way to do that and how to make sure they get stuff documented the right way. But, but not actually. Truly something wrong with it. Like this is a real, like legitimately had somebody that happened to me, they didn't even realize I was eating a sandwich and I was like, fuck this place. Like, I don't wanna help this person 'cause they don't want me to help them.

Yeah. And so like, but what I'm, what I'm getting at with this is these situ, these, these, um, situations, these work environments that are not, uh, ideal for people. We're kind of already seeing this, they're gonna have to pay them more and more in order to work there, right? So like if you wanna, uh, work inpatient, you wanna work PRN odd hours, you're already starting to get paid more for people that are, are gonna be taking jobs in the profession that are less than ideal.

They. Less people are gonna [00:45:00] wanna work there, so they're going to have to pay them more. And for somebody to get reimbursed for that, they're gonna have to get more money for that. Right? And so it's, it's literally, this is the exact conversation we're having with, with, uh, you know, somebody the other day that was bringing this up about the fewer people that take in reimbursement directly from insurance companies increase the likelihood that insurance companies have to pay us more.

And it's, it's such a funny ironic, uh, 180 for what, you know, that's not exactly my goal whenever I went into cash pt, uh, kinda world, but. That might be the end result of it where, you know, for insurance to actually pay PTs what they deserve. Fewer PTs need to take insurance and then they kind of don't have, they don't have a choice 'cause they need to send 'em somewhere.

And if no one wants to see their folks, they've gotta pay 'em what they, what they need. And I mean, it's no different than the va, right? By the time I left, it was hundreds of thousands of dollars a year. And this was, to me, I had no money. So like, it, it was an extreme amount of money because I, I felt like I would be sad there, like going every single day.

Yeah. You know, so people dealing with insurance and all that stuff, they're gonna have to get paid [00:46:00] more just the way it's gonna work.

Yves: Yeah, I think, uh, that's really well said because, you know, uh, what's that quote like, the pain of change is to be harder than the cha, you know, the pain of staying the same.

So like, ultimately as people start getting out of school, you know, they have these rotations and they're like, I literally can't work here, so I'm either gonna, I'm gonna have to go do something else. So the pain, you know, of, uh. Because running a business is really hard, you know? Like we both know that, right?

Like we've had to go through a lot and still go through a lot. But it is not as bad as, yeah, being in a basement and working at the va, you know, unless you have a passion for that. I'm sure there are some people who are like, these, the, this is the community I wanna help. Sure. Like, I did that in pediatrics for multiple years.

Like, I really loved what I did and it's not like I got paid a lot. So there's, there's something to be said there, but you know. Change and now I get to help people in a completely different, in a completely different way. And you know, that's just the, I since going [00:47:00] this route. But it's always like a calling.

It's like this, this is why we kind of did what we did. Right? Like, I wanna make that. That path for people as easy as possible. And so the great part is we started this so soon and have so many iterations that now we just get to keep working towards like, okay, what is the easiest trajectory? If you want to go work in cash now, you can go work for somebody pretty easily.

We have more people hiring. We have hundreds of clinics typically hiring at one time. A hundred percent. Or you can go do your own thing too. Like both of those paths are like more viable now than they've ever been, which is, which is great. So if you're kind of called to that, that path is. As open as it possibly could be.

Like the only other step that hasn't happened yet, which we'll see eventually is like at some point somebody's gonna try to franchise and really go big with something like this. Like, I think we'll see that in our lifetime too. You know, somebody's gonna do the joint except it's gonna be, you know, uh, performance pt, basically.

Like it's going to have, we've seen little musings of that already, so

Danny: I, I think the challenge there is practice acts. Practice acts are so different per state [00:48:00] and it's not like. Um, I mean, I'm sure they are with chiropractic as well, but um, they tend to be better than ours. Yeah. And ours can be very restrictive.

I mean, even just talking to like some of our Texas providers, I think they get like 14 brutal days. Yeah. Dude, it drives me so nuts to think about that. I mean, for God's sakes, dude, we have. Decades of research in the military of direct access, primary care, and we are not dangerous to come to first. In fact, if you look at the, the studies, we are as good at diagnosing musculoskeletal injuries as orthopedic surgeons, you know, and it's like.

Okay, cool. And also red flags are not that fucking hard. You know, like it's pretty, if you, as long as you ask people the right things and you know when to refer people out, you know, it's, it's not like you have cancer that comes across, you know, your, your office that frequently. Right. And, and I've got weird shit with red flags in the military, and you're supposed to.

And, and we have the skillset to do so. And the only reason that we don't do it [00:49:00] is because of, you know, lobbyist groups for different interests within different states. And it sucks because, you know, it's not the best thing for the patient. You know, it's not the cheapest thing, it's not the most cost effective thing.

Otherwise, why would every socialized medical program, including the militaries, have direct access to physical therapists? Because. The number one, uh, cost of healthcare in the military is musculoskeletal injuries. It's also the number one cost that we pay for, for VA hospitals, right? Like, and I know I still go to one.

I I I get it. Like it, I see what's going on there, right? And so like that, that in its own right is, is, is its own animal that needs to be. You know, addressed. And I think states obviously try to make as much progress as they can, but I mean, that's the biggest limiter that I see. And it's really unfortunate because it, it's, it's nothing but special interest that, that causes that.

And it's not what's best for the patient. And there's literally zero, zero actual like evidence founding for why it should be that way. And it's so dumb. I hate it. [00:50:00] Obviously this is, you know, has nothing to do with what we're talking about, but it irritates me because I feel the pain of those people.

'cause they're just like. You're telling me I have 14 days and then I have to get somebody that doesn't know. Do you know what, like in, I think a dentist can actually do a referral for physical therapy here, uh, in Georgia, or used to be, at least it was a practitioner of the healing arch, whoever the fuck that means.

And so I could get a dentist to send me a referral for somebody that has knee problem, what do they know about any of that? Like, in fact, my friend's a dentist and he's like, this is silly. Why? Why is it like that? Good question, man. It's s lobbyist groups. It's the way it is, right? So like it's, it, it sucks for them because they know it shouldn't be like that.

And it does in certain states, meaningfully slow down the process, administratively following up with people. It, it sucks. Uh, and some states are way better than others. So, and hopefully they make progress on that. 'cause I do think that's something that if you're looking at actual costs in healthcare, like that's a great place [00:51:00] to, to de decrease some of that cost.

Yves: Yeah, I mean, every state. I think there is something up in Texas right now, so if you're a PT in Texas, uh, I think there is like a vote happening. One of our coaches brought that to our attention, um, where they're trying to get, uh, that practice act, uh, to be a little better. But you're right. I mean, we need, I don't know how many states have unlimited direct access, but I think a decent number do, even in South Carolina we technically don't have.

Um, but I feel like that's another big milestone that you know, and. I don't know how many groups are doing this. I think the only one that actually actively does this is why I really support the APTAs 'cause they're the ones typically lobbying for us. Yeah. And so, you know, uh, there's a lot of good and bad things about the A PTA, but I think that is a really good one because ultimately we need somebody who's gonna willing to go to Capitol Hill and kind of talk and, and lobby for us.

'cause we know. Chiros physicians, acupuncturists, like all them, they have these lobbyist groups as well. And we're, you know, we've gotta be able to fight them. So, um, yeah, I think that's gonna be a huge milestone if we ever get to the point where there's no, [00:52:00] there's unlimited direct access and that's constantly happening.

Like I know in some, we can now order imaging in some, we can actually order, you know, um, some sort of meds at some point. So the cool part is it is going in that direction and we're, we're seeing that, you know, um. But some, some

Danny: lose. It didn't, didn't one state lose the capacity to dry needle, wasn't it like New Jersey or something like that?

Or North Carolina.

Yves: Oh, I remember that. Yeah, no, absolutely went backwards.

Danny: Or dude, you go to, you can't dry needle in Hawaii unless you're on a military base. Like, I mean, federally do whatever the hell I want. Basically, right. Within our scope of practice, which is pretty broad, but like providers there like couldn't do it, man.

Could, couldn't do it. You, because there's so many acupuncturists, uh, acupuncturist, uh, practices there, California's the same way, right? So when you start looking at this, you're like, oh, why is it like that? Well, it's just because everybody's protective over their piece of the pot, right? Like they, they, they don't look at it from an abundance mentality.

They look at it like, well, if they can't dry needle, then they have to come to acupuncturists, right? It's just like, well, I mean. Maybe, but if, if there were more people [00:53:00] doing needling variations of that sort at all, maybe more people are aware of it and then the, the, the pie gets bigger for everybody, right?

Like, is there so many other ways you could look at that? But yeah, I mean, it, it is, it's a constant battle. It's like con constantly, hopefully moving in the right direction for our profession. I obviously biased, but um, you know, sometimes, sometimes you lose and, uh, it, it goes the other direction. That's actually happened in Georgia.

We had a more. Uh, what would be considered like liberal practice act, especially for smaller practices that wanted to do direct access. And it changed and it actually made it harder. Um, right. Like a couple years after I got in, get got into, uh, into practice and it was actually a big scramble for us to try to figure out how to actually deal with it and healthcare attorneys and all this stuff.

So, you know, I mean, it is what it is, but, but, um, it, it is something that we gotta be aware of and, and yeah, I mean, advocate for those things in your state, you should definitely get involved with that if you feel strongly that you should be, you know, having, having better, um, practice, uh, you know, laws.

Yves: Yeah. Uh, I mean, ultimately from a high level there are way more opportunities than threats. I mean, there are things yes, we definitely need to overcome as a profession and things that could make it [00:54:00] easier. But yeah, ultimately there are way more opportunities, which is, which is great. You know, ultimately, uh, the trend is looking up for people wanting more, you know, seeking out more rehab services and understanding the physical therapy.

I don't know if it's still like, obviously we're in somewhat of a probably echo chamber and bubble, but I definitely feel like more people see physical therapy now with exercise and movement. And when I was a physical therapist, especially in the beginning, it was basically go to physical therapist and get a massage, right?

Hot pack massage. So at least we are now moving away from that a little bit where it's like, oh man, like physical therapy's gonna be hard and I'm gonna have to work out and have to do things. Which is like, okay, that's a big step in the right direction. So ultimately, I think the culture is shifting in a way that.

Is very positive, um, for our profession. I think long term.

Danny: I got introduced at a dinner party one time by a family member and, uh. She, she's like introduced me to her friend. She's like, yeah, this is, this is Danny. He's a physical therapist. It's basically like a mix of [00:55:00] like a massage therapist and a chiropractor.

And uh, I was like, you literally named two adjacent professions that are not mine, uh, to try to explain what it is that I do. And, uh, I realized, I was like, wow. I. We have a brand, do I like, you literally used two completely different providers that you smooshed together. And somehow that was what I am. Uh, you know, so like, I, I do think it's, it's funny, there's definitely like a brand identity problem there, but it's, it's changing.

And I do, I do think it's tying more to movement. If you look at, I mean, there's a lot of. Reasons why, uh, but they're leaning into that more, and I think that they should, uh, because it's, it's in my, in my opinion, like I think it's how we should treat people in the settings that, that we work in. You can't do that in every setting.

But, um, you know, it's, it's what people are looking for too. So when you match those things up with what they need and what they want, like, that is rare and that is a pretty awesome place to be right now. So I think that's a good place to, to wrap it up. Um, you know, look, uh. AI is an interesting thing. It's gonna make us more efficient, really, honestly.

Exciting. I think for our profession, maybe a bit terrifying if I was a computer coder right [00:56:00] now or if I was, you know, doing some clerical work or administrative stuff that's like very redundant. Um, I. I might probably wanna try to re-skill into something else because for sure I see that stuff getting affected quite a lot.

But man, for PTs, what if you can just focus on your patients more and not have to do as much of this sort of like administrative burden that really drains us? Like that is a fantastic. Direction for us to go. So I'm, I'm very excited about it. Um, Yves, anything you want to end with before we wrap it up there?

Yves: Yeah, I mean, I wanna just like almost give a shout out to like everybody out there, you know, like we're gonna call 'em mom and pop shop. Somebody said that to me and I really liked kind of that, you know, it's like these small community-based practices who are just out there trying to get more new patients doing workshops.

Like you're probably doing more for the physical therapy brand identity than any other. Any organization could do a hundred percent right? Like you're changing the way that people are thinking about this. And so, um, I almost, I feel like it's an honor to be able to help those people, right? To be able to help those people be like, all right, I wanna [00:57:00] make a living.

I wanna hire some PTs. I want time, financial freedom. I wanna help my community. And like, we're just gonna keep just striving to give those people more tools and make them more efficient and more profitable, you know, to do what they love. And so, I know you're out there grinding. You know, Danny and I both, uh, did it and now we get to help.

People kind of figured that stuff out. And so I know it's hard and just like, I just, man, keep doing it. And if you're thinking about doing it like, you know, please go do it. Like you could always go back and do home health. You can always go back and I guarantee you find a hospital based job. There are more jobs out there in PT than you could possibly imagine.

Oh yeah. Right. And I don't think that's changing. So like, go give it a shot. Go, go try to do your own thing. You'll probably be surprised, um, of what people will pay you and how well your business can do.

Danny: Yeah. Yeah, that's way to end it. That's fantastic. Yves. Thanks for your time. Um, always good catching up.

Thanks so much for listening and watching if you're watching this on YouTube. Thanks for watching it there. And uh, as always, we'll catch up the next one.