Department Spotlight:Physical Therapy
Dept. Head: Gary Fite
PERSHING PHYSICAL THERAPY IS STILL HERE!!!
We just do not do home health now.
Physical Therapy is one of those services you might not know much about until you need it. A friend came to us after surgery and told me he didn’t want to hurt my feelings, but he thought we only worked with old people. I didn’t want to hurt his feelings, but he is old. I guess he meant older people. Actually we work with all ages. We have helped lots of infants, with developmental issues, learn to roll, sit up, crawl and walk. We work with grade school children with all sorts if injuries, fractures and their complications being a common one. We work with sports injuries of all kinds and all ages, as well as lots of farm and industrial injuries, motor vehicle accidents, workers compensation and disability cases. We do the assessment for qualifying for a power chair. We treat all sorts if itises…arthritis, bursitis, tendonitis, myositis, cellulitis, dermatitis. We work with burns, abrasions, lacerations, post mastectomy programs, post joint replacement, strokes and heart attacks.
We utilize mostly physical modalities of heat, ice, whirlpool, ultrasound, diathermy, electric stimulation and lots of exercise programs. We don’t use many medications, that’s up to your doctor, but we do use some. We have iontophoresis which is a method of putting a drug, usually an anti inflammatory, on a pad and using direct current to push it through the skin for a local effect. It helps sometimes with some of those itises.
Physical therapy has grown a lot in recent years. This area has benefited from this growth. I helped start therapy here in 1978. At the time there was one PT in Chillicothe, one in Moberly, one in Macon, none in Kirksville. Now, in this general area, there are over 35 PTs. Missouri didn’t license physical therapy assistants until 20 years later, 1998. Now there are 30 in the area. In Linn County alone there are 6 PTs and 5 PTA’s. So patients have a choice and this is a good thing.
Pershing has two PT’s and two PTAs. We offer Inpatient, outpatient, and skilled swing bed programs. We have a well equipped full service department as well as a separate cardiac rehabilitation department in a separate area. A referral from a doctor or nurse practitioner is required. We get a lot of referrals from local doctors but nearly as many from specialist in Columbia, Kansas City, Kirksville, St. Louis and other places. A lot of patients have surgery or hospitalization for some reason elsewhere, and then transfer here to a swing bed for rehabilitation. This allows them to be closer to home and family, and frankly, get better individualized care. We recently got out of the home health business, now covered by Serve Link, but patients still have the option of utilizing Pershings’ swing bed program as a transition between acute hospital and home or out patient care.
What ever your need you can get excellent care right here at home. |
