CORNWALL, Ontario – While the COVID-19 pandemic has changed everything, the need to treat pain and work towards physical recovery persists.
Physiotherapists such as Jenny Lee and Natasha Ingram have had to find ways to continue offering their services in a safe and accessible way.
For Lee, she had began her company In-Home Therapeutics before the pandemic had began. Lee is able to offer her clients a portable clinic to meet their physiotherapy needs at home.
Lee explained that even before the pandemic, she saw the need to provide at home therapy.
“The problem wasn’t the lack of motivation of the patient, but there is a disconnect sometimes between getting from point A to B,” she said.
Lee pointed to hurdles such as pain, time, and social discomfort as barriers keeping patients from travelling to clinics to receive treatment.
“The best way to get over these hurdles was to bring the clinic to them,” she said.
Once the pandemic hit an restrictions went into place, Lee’s service became much more in demand.
“COVID has made people realize all they can get done at home,” she said.
Lee is able to offer an at home clinic experience. Equipment she is able to bring with her include exercise machines and an ultra-sound machine.
For Natasha Ingram of Move Therapeutics, she and her staff found effective ways to support their clients remotely.
Move Therapeutics closed their office at the beginning of the pandemic to ensure the safety of staff and clients and began to move to a telehealth model.
“At the time, we faced a number of new challenges ranging from software problems, bandwidth issues and monetary constrictions all the while catering to the needs of our patients strictly through video or phone calls,” she said. “However we quickly discovered with telerehabilitation that current and new patients continued to get better at home and really took ownership over their own rehab. In fact, many clients enjoyed not having to leave the house for appointments and loved to show off their pets and kids during online sessions.”
Move Therapeutics reopened their offices in June, and have worked to ensure the continued safety of clients who wish to meet in person.
“We are still providing plenty of virtual (online) assessments and treatments to our patients, as safety is our number one priority,” she said. “For those that come to the clinic, we have maintained our high standards of cleanliness, and all patients entering the clinic wear masks and are screened for COVID-19.”
