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Leaping to Rehab / BONDED CLIENT


19


the muscles and work your way through them. Someone who likes to have his or her hands on animals and be down on the ground working with them [will be good at rehabilitation],” Carlo said. Making sure rehabilitation is a fit in


the practice is also Woodruff’s advice for an owner considering adding rehabilita- tion services. “As a surgeon, I was already involved


with pain management and recovery issues, and had been big into laser therapy for over 5 years,” Woodruff said. “When Angella suggested rehab, it fit very, very nicely into what we were doing. “I do lots of cruciate ligament repairs.


All my surgical packages now have a rehab consult built in with Dr. Carlo. The package is everything from the procedure until they recover.” If you want to see if rehabilitation is a


good fit for you or your practice, Wood- ruff suggests visiting a rehabilitation clinic. “It’s very eye-opening,” he said. “Most of us in rehab are happy to have a visit. Ask lots of questions. What’s good about it? What’s tough about it?”


Start-up costs Woodruff said he added an addition to


Avondale Veterinary Healthcare Complex to have space “to do it right.” “In 2008, we added 2,500 square feet


for space for a rehab room and did some other changes within the hospital—added another surgery room and set up a cen- tral pharmacy, central lab and large inten- sive care area,” he said. “Probably about $125,000 of the renovation cost was for rehab. “As far as equipment goes, we got an


underwater treadmill, a land treadmill, a small trampoline, a machine for neu- romuscular electrical nerve stimulation, physio balls, balance boards and other small equipment.” If you cannot afford such an upfront


investment or want to start small, Carlo says, “Start with your hands and smaller pieces of equipment. It’s helpful to have treadmills, but I have clients who don’t


Trends magazine, November 2012


want to do those, and I can still work with patients with exercises and massage to get them back to recovery.” Avondale Veterinary Healthcare Com-


plex started with postsurgery clients and now also works with dogs with neuro- logical and geriatric conditions as well as with agility dogs for injury retraining or conditioning. Carlo says clients have responded well. “You always have those who are a


little more skeptical at first, and it’s inter- esting to see them come around when they see their pets get better—even better than they were before surgery,” she said. “We recently had two dogs with


fibrocartilaginous emboli,” Woodruff said. “Usually, dogs with this particular problem would take a long time to get up. Working with someone who knows rehab to pattern their walking behavior and get them up on a balance ball to load that back end has been very effective and very rewarding. To see these dogs go from not being able to walk to using their legs after a couple of weeks…. Both sets of owners have been so excited.” “We are currently reaching out to other


vets [for referrals],” Carlo said. “I’m doing lunch-and-learns for doctors in the area.”


The referral relationship If you are considering offering rehabil-


itation at your practice, one decision you will need to make is if you will be accept- ing referrals or just providing services for your own clientele. “If accepting referrals, the practice


needs to respect the primary care referring veterinarian’s relationship with the client and keep the primary care veterinarian in the loop,” says LoGiudice, who practices at Integrative Pet Care specialty centers in Chicago and Hanover Park, Ill. “Referring veterinarians often are concerned that if they send a patient to another traditional practice that houses a specialty service such as rehabilitation, they may lose the patient to this other practice.” If you are looking for a good thera- pist to whom you can refer patients,


If you are


considering offering


rehabilitation


at your practice, one decision


you will need to make is if you


will be accepting referrals or


just providing


services for your own clientele.


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