PTs, It’s Time to Level Up or Step Aside

0:00 You're listening to the PT Pinecast, where smart people in healthcare come to make noise. Here's your host, Jimmy McKay. Thanks, voiceover guy. I'm not on the camera. All right, scooch to your right a little bit. We are live. We're making this up. It doesn't really matter. It's a podcast. Lisa Van Hoose to my right, Rebecca Griffith to her radio right, and we're live from Graham Sessions. And I'm not sure why I'm asking this a lot, but how many Graham Sessions is this for you? I was trying to count. I know it's been more than five. Wow, that's a lot. Three, two. This is my third. Your third. This is my third as well. So why did you come the first time and why do you keep coming back? We'll go with Lisa first.

0:40 So I came the first time because I heard through the grapevine that there were these like heated conversations happening. And I was like, I needed to be in the room where it was happening. And I keep coming back because it's one of my favorite places because you can come in here, you can have that conversation, say those things and be like, what do y'all think about that? And the ground rules are we can say anything that was said, but we'll just never, we want to attach it to anybody. So you can feel free to say anything in that room. The ideas should leave the room, but who said them doesn't have to leave the room. i won't say what you said but you did not shy at all went right to the microphone twenty five minutes ago and you were like you're like i have something to say and i'm like that's i don't know i leaned over to someone else and said uh she's ready to talk and i know there's a line but she's ready to talk now and that's lines are not really lines enough for lisa why do you come back rebecca The first time I came, I was invited to be on a panel to talk about access, which is obviously one of the things that's most important to me is that our patients can't get to us when they need to.

1:42 And then last year, last time I came, I gave a what I believe speech. And what I believe is that physical therapists could change the world, but we won't. Why? Well, because we're waiting for permission. And we already have it. So we have to do it. Right. Yeah. And we're scary. We're scary or scared? We are scared. Oh, we are scared. Of? Of. I think it's our own imposter syndrome. We're so rule follower-y. And we're very employee mindset. Like follow. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Technician, not doctor. Yeah. So I'm back this year to listen. Cool. But you'll say something when you have something to say.

2:22 She already said something. I'm not going to actually say it. I can't say what you said. That's the rules. What are you excited to see discussed and what are you upset that it's not on the menu? I'm excited about the Big Beautiful Bill conversation. Okay. That whole conversation around professional designation. What I am a little sad that we're not talking about is still the lack of diversification of our workforce. I feel like we talked about that a lot five years ago. But now we're scared. And then we stopped talking about that. Yeah, because there's political powers. Because it's solved? Because it's solved? Well, you know, now we're redefining, you know, marginalized groups as dominant groups now.

3:09 Yeah. Interesting point of view. Yeah. What are you excited and upset that's not on my docket? I was excited to hear the primary care conversation this morning because I think that's an area of practice that I'm in. But I'm also interested in the one about generational differences because I hear a lot of clinical owners and business owners complain to me and say, well, nobody wants to work anymore or I can't get that generation to XYZ. And I also have teenagers and we're like six, seven and all that. And I feel like. We have to be able to communicate with the people that came behind us because now we're just turning into our parents. So I'm excited. We're saying the things that we were pissed at these kids today. Now it's coming out of your mouth. So pause before you say that. So let's talk about those two that you just said. So primary care, there was, and correct me if I'm wrong, I'll just structure it.

3:52 There was a policy win in Utah. That's what like sort of starts part of it. Hey, now we're primary care. And what does that mean? And what does it change? And all those things are for smarter policy people to talk about. I come in and I go because I can say what I said. You can say what you said, but you can't say what someone else said. I said, this is awesome. And then I think I made everybody in this room where I'm the seventh floor of APTA Avengers Tower here in Alexandria, where we're looking Washington. I made everybody made everybody look outside the windows, look out the window, look at the window, look at it, look. And people weren't doing it. I was like, look outside the window. None of those people understand what the hell primary care physical therapy is. It's as confusing as when do I go to the urgent care? And how many words was the definition?

4:33 Eighty-three. Do you think I counted or did I take a picture of the definition in AI and make it count for me? Of course. Yeah. Because I'm not an idiot. But that's the point. And I will give credit. People just don't want to work hard these days. You should have counted it yourself. Smarter, not harder. And I know that's an internal definition for us. But, and this is not to knock. I don't think anybody here is really to knock a person. But we're to push and pressure ideas and say, this is cool. And I think my last question or my last statement, which, by the way, is the best way to look smart, is just ask questions at a big conference like this, but never answer them. Oh, you taught a whole masterclass last night over beers. My last question or my last statement, which sounded like a question, was this will fail if you fail to message this right.

5:18 And I know I'm coming from a lens of marketing and communications, whatever it is, because that's my life. But I'm like, I see what you're doing. This is great. But if the people outside the seventh floor window here don't understand it, quickly, clearly, concisely, consistently, we'll lose here. And we will be confused how we lost. And I will point right back to that moment. I actually disagree with you. I don't think that it's on the people outside to understand it. I think it's on every physical therapist to own it. And once they start practicing that way, that just becomes the standard of care. And so when people come to a physical therapist, that's just the care that they expect. So I think until every physical therapist starts leveling up and then providing that level of care, that level of expertise, it doesn't matter what the people out there think.

6:01 Like marketing it and bringing patients in, we don't need to do that. We need to take the patients we have and own them and raise those people up. And then like you heard, there are people like, can you see this patient? Can you get this person in? Like I've sent my physical therapist tons of patients because he does have a primary care mindset. And I know those patients will be taken care of, not treated. Show, don't tell. That's what I should have said. That was my mic drop moment. Show the people outside this. Show the people directly outside this building, which are our colleagues. Show them how to communicate this and then to be able to show, not just tell the public. You have to be a primary care provider before you start doing it. There you go. And now you don't have to market anything. You are acting as if.

6:42 Act as if. Maybe primary care, maybe that's the rollout. but maybe not act. Okay. Well, I meant like act as if, yeah, I know. But act as if the first time I ever scored a goal in like high school hockey, like I celebrated, like I just won the Stanley cup and my coach was like, Hey, great work. Act as pretend like you've been there before. Cause I think part of our issue right now is we have a lot of PTs that are acting. Okay. Right. Where we've got this list of things related to contemporary practice that you are fully aware that you need to upskill, but you're not doing that. And so I'm just going to put it out there. This is Lisa Van Hoose. I'm saying this as an individual. You are providing subpar care. And so if that's what you're willing to do, then you can't complain about subpar payments.

7:25 Oh, so I'm like, level up and then we can talk about having some improvements in payment. Tony Maritato, my live stream co-host, has said and pointed out something similar, which is, do you honestly believe that half of the profession is better than half? what we're being paid because medicare is just one example is saying you are worth this much money per hour and people get mad i'm like who's getting mad do you think that half more than half the profession is better than that if the answer is yes then we deserve more or do we have to raise the floor of our well and truly like if you were being paid more for that for what you were doing where's the incentive to do better too i think that's a piece of it also chicken egg egg chicken uh because you know like right now the big conversation is groceries right that's the big political conversation i love frosted flakes right but it's got to be kellogg's but i'm gonna be mad if i go pay a kellogg's price and i'm getting some off correct i don't want that agreed i don't want that and so i think part of what we see in social media right now is patients and clients and caregivers are talking about i went to a pt i was expecting this but I got something underneath that.

8:36 Now there are those PTs out where we're going to shout you out that are providing amazing care, but I'm not comfortable saying it's fifty percent of us right now because we're doing just enough for whatever reason. And that's where I feel like we need to follow some Mel Robbins, right? Let you move on. If this isn't what you want to do, if you don't want to upskill to where we're trying to be as a profession, Move on. There's all different types of things you can do in the world. Agreed. You don't have to be a PT. You can leave the house. Spicy takes before noon at Graham Sessions, Lisa Van Hoose. I don't even think that's spicy. It's not even spicy. And it's okay to change. It is totally okay to change. I'm not going to call you a bad PT. I'm not going to say you're a bad human.

9:16 You just decided that the profession is going this way. I don't want to do that. Yeah. But then follow through on that. Don't stick around. And then complain. Right. Or provide subpart care. I will point that out as well. You know, being mad about a thing you're not doing feels a little bit defeated or not productive. So I just play the world's smallest violin for people who do that. And life is short. Yeah. Don't do things you don't want to do. Here for a good time, not a long time. I had a conversation with somebody the other day that PT is like, we're just in a burning building. And you know that you've got that meme where you've got the dog sitting in the burning building. It's fine. It's fine. It's all fine. And are you going to be that dog and just sit there while the burning building consumes you?

10:00 You could exit the building. You could help put out the fire. But if you continue to sit there in the burning building and say, why don't the fire department come and put out this fire? Or I didn't start this fire. I'm beginning burned and I didn't start this fire. Okay. So exit the building or get a fire extinguisher. But we need you to take a role here other than somebody that has to be rescued. Yeah. I think I said this yesterday. The worst thing to do in a panic situation, my dad taught me, was panic. The second worst thing to do in a panic situation is nothing. Nothing. If you think it's that bad, don't panic. But do something productive. Leave whatever system you're in. And I'm talking about physically where you work or practice or work. How you're doing that. You have other levers to pull other than leave completely, but it's also okay if you want to leave completely.

10:46 You have the door, push, pull, it goes either way. We all have power, right? So we've got power to change things within ourselves. that building. I think people also forget that the profession is made up of people. So when you're talking about the profession sucks, you're actually self-loathing because you're saying you suck because you're part of us. Right. And you also always have the power to leave. So I'm like, recognize your power and then decide on how you're going to use it. Agreed. All right. We try to keep the, we're trying to keep these short under This is The Parting Shot. One last mic drop moment.

11:27 No pressure. Just your legacy on the line. Sounds like scary when you say your legacy on the line. But Parting Shot, just one concept, one mic drop moment, just one thing you want to leave with the audience. What do you got? You got to be about it, not just talk about it. put that on a crochet that on a pillow gotta be about it don't just talk about it good luck following that i know that was a good one you have ism you have sayings i'm gonna sit with the fact that individualism is a fallacy right so this concept that just you are gonna make some difference or all the only thing that matters is you is a joke it's all about the collective us all right well we're gonna have s'mores later because we're at graham sessions here at apta headquarters in alexandria virginia lisa van hoose rebecca griffith thanks for talking that's it for this one but we're just getting warmed up smash follow send it to a friend or crank up the next episode want to go deeper hit us at pgpiecast.com or find us on youtube and socials at pgpiecast and legally none of this was advice it's for entertainment purposes only See, Keith?

12:38 We read the script. Happy now?