How To Start Your Own Physical Medicine And Rehabilitation Clinic

As a physical medicine and rehabilitation practitioner, you know how important it is to provide quality care to your patients.

Opening your own private practice provides you with the opportunity to expand your career and provide better patient care than ever before.

Perhaps you’ve been working in a hospital for several years and are looking for more professional autonomy.

Or, maybe you’re a young doctor hoping to make a name for yourself in private practice.

Regardless of your motivation, starting your own physical medicine and rehabilitation clinic can be an immensely rewarding (and profitable) experience.

However, it can also be a labor and cost intensive process that requires concise, detailed planning from the get go.

But it doesn’t have to be that way.

Joining a medical coworking space like Symbiosis can help you start your own physical medical and rehabilitation private practice more quickly, more effectively, and for a fraction of the cost.

But more on that in a bit.

For now, let’s take a look at the benefits of starting a physical medicine and rehabilitation private practice as well as some of the essentials you’ll need to do so.

Why Start A Physical Medicine And Rehabilitation Private Practice?

Since most physical medicine providers work within hospitals or other large enterprise systems, starting your own private practice can provide you with several unique opportunities.

For starters, branching away from corporate healthcare grants you considerably more autonomy.

You’ll no longer have to answer to higher ups, with no medical knowledge or training, before making major decisions.

As a private practice, you have to operate within AAPMR’s guidelines, but they give you more freedom than operating under tight corporate guidelines.

This can help you establish a healthier work life balance and avoid feeling burnt out.

Additionally, opening your own private practice means you’ll get to choose the clinic location and serve the types of clients you want to serve.

The possibilities are virtually endless.

5 Things You’ll Need To Start A Physical Medicine And Rehabilitation Private Practice

Truthfully, there is no universal formula that’ll guarantee success when it comes to starting your own private practice.

However, there are some things you can plan for to improve your chances of success.

Below is a list of some examples.

1. A Clinical Scope Of Practice

Deciding on your clinical scope of practice is one of the first steps in building your own private practice.

After all, it’ll determine which procedures and activities your clinic will be allowed to perform.

This is mostly determined by your education, training, and expertise.

However, it’s important to remember that your clinical scope of practice can change from state to state.

For instance, your scope of practice permitted by law as a physical medicine and rehabilitation practitioner might differ depending on the state.

Therefore, it’s important to be knowledgeable about your state’s laws before determining your clinical scope of practice.

It’s also important to remember, though, that just because you learned about it in school doesn’t mean you have to offer it as part of your practice.

There may be certain populations or conditions you prefer to treat.

Or you may find a market opportunity to work with a certain population or condition.

2. A Convenient Clinic Location

After determining your clinical scope of practice, your next step is to start shopping for clinic locations.

There’s a lot to take into consideration when deciding on a clinic location.

For instance, you’ll need to consider accessibility, proximity to potential clients, and lack of saturation when picking a clinic location.

You’ll have to decide which features are important in a clinic location.

For example, you may consider practicing in a remote, underserved location.

However, it might make building a referral base with nearby providers more difficult.

Ultimately, you’ll need to make sure that your clinic location provides you with opportunities for your business to grow while also staying within your budget.

3. Various Equipment For Your Clinic

Choosing the right equipment for your clinic takes a lot of research.

When just starting your private practice, it’s important to purchase the type of equipment that will help your clinic run smoothly and efficiently.

One example of such equipment is an electronic health record system (EHR).

A good quality EHR system can help your front end staff by digitizing patient records and histories, keeping track of all patient communications and lab work, and provide information on your revenue cycle.

These benefits are invaluable when just starting out because they can save you quite a bit of money and time which can be otherwise invested in building your business.

You might also consider purchasing equipment that’ll improve your patient care, such as assistive and restorative technologies including:

• 3D computer technology and printing for hand and wrist braces
• Assistive technology for spinal cord injury
• Technology to perform walking assessments
• Functional electrical stimulation

4. Front Desk Staff

Your front end staff will be responsible for keeping your clinic running efficiently.

One of the most important members of your front end staff will be the office manager.

Your office manager will be responsible for running all types of day to day operations, so it’s important that you hire wisely.

The ideal candidate will be someone with relevant experience, such as someone who’s worked in healthcare.

Other important professions that need to be part of your team include:

• An accountant
• A business consultant
• A private practice digital marketing team
• (Please add to this list as necessary)

5. A Way To Acquire New Patients

Last but certainly not least, you’ll need to find a way to acquire new patients to your new private practice.

One of the ways you can do this is through networking with other healthcare providers.

Joining a medical coworking space like Symbiosis provides you with the perfect opportunity to do that.

Another way of attracting new patients is adding complementary services into your practice.

These services add an extra expense to your budget.

However, they also provide your patients with invaluable convenience.

Potential patients might be more inclined to choose your practice if they can get all their tests done at the same location, for example.

Finally, you’ll also want to create concrete patient policies and procedures in order to address any issues with patient satisfaction.

Is Owning A Physical Medicine And Rehabilitation Private Practice Profitable?

Starting your own physical medicine and rehabilitation private practice can be very profitable.

However, most private practitioners don’t see any real profit for the first several years.

This is partially due to the overhead costs discussed above.

One of the best ways to streamline this process and see profit faster is joining a medical coworking space, such as Symbiosis.

How The Medical Coworking Space At Symbiosis Can Help

At Symbiosis, our medical coworking space provides a variety of benefits to practitioners just like you.

It’s a space for entrepreneurial minds to get together and pool resources.

Some of the benefits our medical coworking space provides include:

• Networking opportunities
• Time and money saving opportunities through pooled resources
• Staffing support
• IT support
• Mail concierge
• Security
• Janitorial services
• And much more

In short, joining Symbiosis’ medical coworking space can help you thrive as a physical medicine and rehabilitation provider.

Starting your practice at Symbiosis combines the benefits of starting your own clinic vs joining an existing one.

You get the freedom of being able to call the shots with your practice, without the stress of having to directly manage everything on your own and all the expenses that come with it.

We take all the headaches out of starting your own private practice, so you can focus on what you do best – treating your patients.

Contact Symbiosis To Start Your Own Private Practice Today

So why wait?

At Symbiosis, we’re happy to answer any questions you have regarding our medical coworking space.

We’re here to help you in your private practice journey.

Contact Symbiosis, and take your first step toward starting your own private practice today.