If we had a pound for every time we’ve been offered something that promises to be better than the next best thing, we’d be rich indeed. Promising is one thing, delivering on that promise is another – and that goes for physiotherapy as much as anything else.
Whether you’re a patient, a GP or a Consultant orthopaedic surgeon looking for a world class, reputable physiotherapy practice you can refer your patients to, it’s an absolute certainty that you’re going to be spoiled for choice – especially in the heart of London.
Claiming to be different is a tall order, and yet here we are, doing exactly that.
Well, unless there’s someone out there treating something no-one’s ever heard of – which, let’s face it, is highly unlikely – then the truth is that it won’t come down to just one thing. Instead, it’ll be a combination of qualities that include experience, expertise, training and ethos.
Above all, though, it comes down to the way we view and treat our patients.
The service provided by many physiotherapy practices starts with the treatments they can offer rather than the people they’re treating. At West 1 Physio, we think that’s a bit like putting the cart before the horse.
We already know our therapists are among the most experienced around – that’s why we hired them in the first place – and we know we use state of the art techniques and equipment to ensure our patients have the best possible chance of making a quick and complete recovery.
But regardless of the treatment plans we develop for our clients – and each one is tailored to the specific condition that needs to be managed or resolved – absolutely everything we do starts with the person who walks through our door for the very first time.
We work closely with orthopaedic specialists – including Consultant orthopaedic surgeons –GPs and other health professionals working in the field of physical rehabilitation who refer their cases to us to complement and augment the clinical treatment they’re providing.
So, what does that mean for us and the way we approach our work? Quite simply this: for a great many people who enter our Harley Street clinic, we are their best hope of making a full recovery and returning to a life that, often, has been adversely affected by persistent or chronic pain.
As a result, we spend a lot of time being human first as well, trying to understand and empathise with the patients we see, ensuring they understand what we’re doing, what we hope to achieve, their own role in their recovery and the timescales that might be involved.
It’s hard to imagine there might be a physiotherapy practice out there that tries to be anything less than good at what they do. But we strive to be better than that.
Our therapists aren’t just recruited for their training and qualification. They’re not even recruited solely for their physiotherapy experience. It goes without saying that we consider the people who work with us here in London to be the crème de la crème of physiotherapy talent available.
But they also need to have lived a bit. We boast a wealth of experience gained outside private practice. We have physiotherapy specialists who have worked with elite athletes in sports physio, those who are leading authorities in occupational physiotherapy and women’s issues and therapists who boast great knowledge gained in other sectors.
We don’t rely on technology to do our job for us – we spent many years in a demanding training environment learning how to make our hands do that! But we do also know that technology can greatly help the way we focus and target our treatments – whether that’s for gait analysis, mobility assessment or occupational health reviews.
While there are some clinics that might be tempted to invest in every new piece of shiny kit, we handpick the equipment we believe is necessary to help speed the recovery of the people we treat.
We think life is for the living, and so while our priority is to help you to recover from the condition you or your patient is struggling with, we also appreciate that no one wants to be wrapped in cotton wool and told they can never again do the thing they loved (and which occasionally is responsible for bringing them to us in the first place!)
And whilst very occasionally an injury does mean the end of a hobby or interest, we’ll always do our very best to avoid that being the case.
So, part of our focus is on education. We’re not in the business of delivering in-depth lessons on human anatomy or the limitations of the musculoskeletal condition, but we do think part of our responsibility is to help you or your patients to understand how their body responds – or is likely to respond – to the continued demands we make on it.
That means we’ll spend time ensuring everyone we treat has a working understanding of how they came to be in pain to begin with, what the triggers are likely to be in the future and what they can do to protect themselves while also enjoying the things they love.
If you have patients who need a holistic approach to physiotherapy or you have an injury and you’re looking for private care that will put your health, wellness and recovery at the heart of your care plan, please contact us to get in touch.
