Extension of treatment times with PhysioPlus

When the treatment time of physiotherapy is not sufficient

For years, health insurance benefits for physiotherapy treatments have been decreasing. Physiotherapists must therefore limit their treatment times for physiotherapy or manual therapy measures to 20 minutes. Unfortunately, these times are far from sufficient. Because in these 20 minutes, in addition to the actual treatment, there are other things to be done, such as

• the patient has to get dressed and undressed during this time
• the treatment room must be prepared
• the patient must be advised and informed
• the entire treatment must be documented
• the treatment room must be prepared for the next patient
• further appointments have to be coordinated.

Thus the actual treatment time often shrinks to only 15 minutes. The physiotherapists then often have no choice but to provide information and advice during the treatment.

Doctors are restricted in issuing prescriptions for remedies

In the past, physicians had the option to more often issue prescriptions with at least 12 treatment appointments with the physical therapist for patients. Additional services such as a massage or mud packs were also included. Today, on the other hand, doctors‘ prescriptions are usually limited to 6 treatment appointments. Medical practices now only have a limited budget available for remedies in a given period of time. This budget is based on the type of physician, the respective region and the amount of remedies prescribed by the physician in the past. If the physician exceeds the budget in the specified period, it is possible that the health insurance company or the Association of Statutory Health Insurance Physicians may even have this additional amount reimbursed by the physician. Therefore, in addition to the patient’s clinical picture, it also depends on the prescribing physician and his budget and on the respective region. This often results in conflicts of interest that are at the expense of patients.

Consequences for patients

1. There is no time for a detailed analysis of the patient to find out solution and therapy approaches.
2. In the short treatment time of only about 15 minutes, the therapist can often only achieve symptom relief. A sustainable therapy requires more time.
3. In the worst case, not even the symptoms are alleviated within the short treatment time. Frequently, new doctor’s appointments are necessary and further prescriptions have to be issued, which again can take a lot of time.
4. The cost brake of the public health insurance companies has a negative effect on the success of the patients‘ treatment.

How is a sustainable therapy possible despite cost pressure?

Patients who have received a prescription for physiotherapy can extend their treatment time per appointment with PhysioPlus. Time extensions of 10 or 20 minutes are possible, but longer times can also be arranged to achieve the best possible treatment success.

Advantages of extending the treatment time

• the therapist can respond more intensively to the complaints of the respective patient
• a high quality physiotherapeutic treatment is made possible
• on the basis of the original prescription, the treatment can be continued without a prescription until the goal of the treatment is achieved
• the PhysioPlus treatment concept enables an extension of the treatment time of up to one hour
• the additional time acquired is pure treatment time
• the patient is free of complaints more quickly
• the treatment success has a lasting effect