Lets wrap it up with a little recap of the biggest benefits of direct access, or your right to directly access physical therapy services without a physician referral or prescription. Share your questions in the comment section below, and well tackle them throughout our October blog posts and during this months webinar. Use of this and other APTA websites constitutes acceptance of our Terms & Conditions. , Stevens A. Kelly
Pros and Cons Weeks where you could have been getting the help you needed. Direct Access Physical Therapy and Diagnostic In popular culture, the word access implies exclusivitylike a backstage pass to a rock concert or high-level clearance to government files. Of the 1,501 articles that were screened, 8 articles at levels 3 to 4 on the CEBM scale were included. , DiAngelis T. Modified Downs and Black Criteria and Scoring Guidelinesa, For original criteria, refer to Downs and Black.17, One Method of Calculating Differences in Cost Between Direct Access and Physician-Referred Episodes of Care. I=intervention group, C=comparison group, D&B=Downs and Black checlist (see Appendix 1 for criteria), NH =National Health Service, BCBS=Blue Cross Blue Shield, pts=patients, CEBM=Centre for Evidence- Based Medicine, dx=diagnosis, DC=discharge, PT=physical therapist, msk=musculoskeletal, peds=pediatrics, 95% CI=95% confidence interval, GP-general practitioner, NR=not reported, NS=not significant. Clipboard, Search History, and several other advanced features are temporarily unavailable. The APTA explains that beyond being in the drivers seat when it comes to obtaining patients, direct access also empowers PTs to: One more way direct access helps PTs: it eliminates barriers to entry. For Advertisers, Exhibitors, and Sponsors | For Media. The .gov means its official. Please check for further notifications by email. Results were summarized qualitatively by outcome measures (included below) and are presented in further detail in Table 2. Leemrijse et al8 reported that the percentage of patients who fully achieved goals at discharge was 9% more in the direct access group compared with the physician referral group (P<.001).