After watching her employers in an insurance-based practice “drowning and miserable” for 5 years, Alicia Willoughby knew she wouldn’t work in that business model for the rest of her career. She searched for information on the private-pay model, which led her to the Cash-Based Practice Podcast. As she learned more, she began reaching out to others who were succeeding with their cash-pay practices. 

Finally, she was ready to take the plunge and started her own pre- and post-partum physical therapy practice. Three years later, Alicia’s practice is succeeding beyond what she even imagined was possible. She is now exploring online business opportunities and anything outside the crushing constraints of the “medical box.”

In this interview, Alicia explains exactly how she started and built her niche physical therapy practice from inception. She openly shares the details of her journey, including what has worked best for building and marketing her practice.

Dr. Carlos Berio shares his strategies for growing a cash practice to include multiple therapists. He candidly discusses the practical considerations of hiring in detail, including approaches to compensation and incentives.

During PT school, Greg found a fantastic sports rehab website and set up a clinical rotation with its founder, Joe Heiler. That experience was life changing for Greg. After graduation, he found work as a physical therapist and later decided to start his own cash-based practice part-time. 

Greg soon found his employment schedule was limiting the growth of his own practice, so he quit his other job and committed to his own business full-time. When presented with the opportunity to take over the sports rehab website he knew and loved, Greg enthusiastically jumped in because it provided a welcome source of stable revenue as his practice gradually found its market. Ever since, Greg has been building two businesses, which has been a blessing and a challenge for a single person. Now, his online business has grown to offer highly interactive, educational programs; and his cash-based sports rehab practice is preparing to hire its first employee!

In this interview, Greg shares what he’s learned in his experiences with gyms, marketing efforts, referral sources, and software. 

Considering starting a cash-based practice or online business? Here’s my advice on the top things to consider in your decision-making process that will ensure you are geared toward success.This “highlight” is from a full interview I did with Chad Prince.

More specifically, we discuss these cash-based practice topics:

• Setting realistic expectations for profit margins, overhead costs, and the overall time commitment.
• The importance of leveraging experts instead of doing it all yourself.
• Approaches for hiring online contractors to make sure you get what you need.
• The best strategy for developing a new product that will sell.

After leaving a career in finance where he was “pretty miserable,” Mike Braitsch decided to start anew and pursue his passion for physical therapy. During his education at UT Southwestern, he combined his knowledge in PT and a background in martial arts to put together a pilot program to test the benefits of boxing and martial arts training for Parkinson’s patients. The program did so well that he decided to open his own practice after completing school. 

Three years later, Mike’s practice is open and now offers 18 different group classes for people with Parkinson’s and other forms of Parkinsonism. His structured, group approach is augmented with one-on-one therapy to keep patients engaged and active long term, resulting in a thriving practice (with another PT employee) in just 3 years.

If you can’t find your dream job, create it! After receiving her PT degree, Kelsey Baas found rewarding work in the specialties of developmental pediatrics and orthopedics in a Houston hospital, and saw the importance of multiple disciplinary teams in providing the best care. But personally, she and her husband wanted to move back to Waco. Since Waco offered no opportunities for her to work in a way that integrated the specialties she’d come to appreciate so much, she decided to create her own multidisciplinary cash-based practice.

Soon after, she opened Compleo Physical Therapy & Wellness, a one-stop-shop that can take care of the whole family to keep everyone healthy and active. Initially offering physical therapy, counseling, and a dietician; the practice has grown and recently added pilates and personal trainer… in just 2 short years!

In this interview, Kelsey shares what has worked as well as the important adjustments she’s made along the way to make this novel approach to healthcare work in a small-town environment. She explains why she went from fully cash-based to the current hybrid model that accepts insurance from a single carrier and when this same model may be the best fit for others listening in.. And she shares what she’s learned about managing employees and marketing that has allowed her to grow her practice while maintaining a high quality of life.

In 2005, Rob Vining developed and launched the world’s first digital practice for physical therapy. His telehealth model allowed him to accept and treat patients from all over the world on a cash-pay basis, and it became clear those patients were getting great results. In time, Rob found himself focusing more on developing software tools that would enable medical professionals to easily enter the growing telehealth market. He and his students are proving the potential for PTs to become more efficient and profitable by making telehealth visits available for the convenience of existing patients as well as by reaching the large number of potential customers who are unable or unwilling to pursue in-person PT. 

In this interview, Rob explains how telehealth visits work in terms of effectiveness, technology, workflow, marketing and conversions, and legal issues … And he also explains something I didn’t realize was possible: how a telehealth component added to your website can massively increase in-clinic/local leads for your brick-and-mortar practice!

He shares details about how software tools make such visits easy to implement and relatively low cost for those considering a jump into private practice. His approaches for marketing, including a highly effective strategy for lead generation, offer any practice an opportunity to create new sources of revenue with little risk. And finally, he offers a very-encouraging update on telehealth legislation that may soon bring telehealth into the mainstream in terms of Medicare and insurance acceptance.

After PT school, Cameron Garber found himself increasingly frustrated by the standard approach to healthcare that focuses on treating illnesses rather than preventing them. This led him to buy an existing partially cash-based practice that would allow him to offer the kind of care he felt was best for his patients. However, this decision proved troublesome for many reasons, and Cameron struggled to make it work (which we discuss in detail) —eventually letting go of virtually all the existing patients, referral sources, insurance contracts, and employees he’d acquired! 

With some courage, guidance from coaches, and a real interest in helping people live life on their own terms, the business of his dreams gradually emerged from the ashes and is now growing nicely with a monthly payment model … a model designed to stabilize cash-flow and provide patients with more than just an injury fix, but a life-changing focus on long term health and wellness. 

In this interview, Cameron shares details of what worked, what didn’t work, and what he’d do differently. He also explains the approach that works best for communicating with potential and new patients for highest conversion rates and buy-in to long-term care plans. And finally, we discuss how upfront transparency about costs contributes to the value patients see in the service, and how his cash-pay monthly payment plans work well for the business as well as the patients’ compliance to a truly transformative plan of care.

“Am I living out my purpose?” That’s the question Amanda Heritage asked herself as she assessed her career in physical therapy. When she realized the answer was “no,” she knew she needed to make a change. Despite the naysayers who told her it was impossible to create a successful cash-based PT practice in southern New Jersey, she decided to give it a go. 

She began looking online to learn how to build a profitable, cash-based practice that could meet the needs of an underserved market. By July 2017, she left her job and launched a cash-based practice focused on PT for pelvic health. In less than a year, her original vision of a thriving niche PT practice that enables her to fulfill her purpose has become a reality!  

In this interview, Amanda shares her key insights from the past year and the special considerations that come with marketing a niche business. She explains how she’s built her referral network and what she did to manage an unexpected surge in business last October. And she offers her strategies for keeping the right mindset as you find your way.

In this interview, Tony describes how he built a 100% mobile neuro cash-based practice from scratch, walking us through his journey and how he specifically got started with home care. He shares specifics on his main referral sources which unexpectedly came from not having a fax machine and what has been the best marketing strategies for his practice.

Tony also give some great advice on hiring and working with independent contractors and how, more importantly, and how he’s working within the tax laws. You’ll learn in this episode how Tony schedules his day and week running a fully mobile practice. He also describes how he’s able to have conversations with potential patients that lead to long term care.