Positive Health Online

Let’s face it, every back care clinic would like a new revenue stream, but that isn’t always easy to achieve. Maybe you simply don’t have the hours in the day to take on any new patients, or enough staff, or perhaps a key team member recently left either taking patients with them or giving patients a reason to look elsewhere. Or maybe years of physical work has taken its toll and you simply need to take it a bit easier. Whatever the reason, the good news is, there is a solution: an IDD Therapy machine.

Here are six ways adding an IDD machine to your practice can solve all the problems I mentioned above:

Let’s Talk Money

Sometimes I am a bit wary about talking about money as it can be a bit of a dirty word for some people, but honestly if you could add an extra £50k-£100k profit a year to your business with one investment, why wouldn’t you?

An IDD Therapy machine (Accu SPINA) can bring in a substantial new revenue stream where even just one extra patient coming through the door each month will create a profit.

The reality though is that it won’t just be one extra patient that it attracts. A clinic with IDD on offer will more likely see another five to ten new patients a month requiring treatment.

IDD Therapy is a computer-controlled spinal decompression treatment which practitioners use to decompress the affected spinal segments.  This non-surgical treatment sees patients lie fully clothed on the table of the Accu SPINA machine. 

IDD Therapy treatment with Accu SPINA

They are connected to the machine by ergonomic pelvis and chest harnesses and then a gentle force pulls the pelvic harness at a precise angle.  The way in which the force is applied means that we can take pressure off the affected spinal segment and importantly, gently stretch and work the tissues. This is done through a series of distraction and mobilisation cycles to help release muscle spasm and improve mobility.

Patients have a series of twenty-five-minute sessions on the Accu SPINA machine.  IDD Therapy treatment is combined with hands on treatment and exercise, to help address some of the other underlying causes which led to the problem manifesting in the first place.

By decompressing the disc, restoring mobility and taking pressure off nerves, patients can make significant improvement and return to a pain free life.

And, with the average cost of a session being in the region of £75 - £90 and a recommended course of around 20 sessions, including an IDD machine in your practice can realistically increase profits from a modest £25k to up to and over £100k a year.

Attracting a New Category of Patient

The addition of IDD Therapy in your clinic means you are able to attract a whole new category of patients with more complex needs.

By offering this advanced method of spinal care, an opportunity immediately opens up to a brand-new patient base. These are patients who will require longer and higher value care which in turn will create an additional and larger income.

IDD Therapy is rapidly gaining momentum in its adoption for treating back pain and neck pain, especially for unresolved disc-pathologies.

Opening up a practice to this wider horizon enables treatment for a more varied category of patients, thereby blurring the traditional line between generalists and specialists.

Your own clinic might, in the past, have specialized in general pain and injury rehab. It will no doubt have built up a reputation as the place to go for specific treatments such as a sports injury.

But by adding IDD Therapy to the practice you are opening the door wide to a niche – but significant – patient population with specific needs and the very nature of the treatment required creates a bigger, more profitable revenue stream than dealing with only acute injury.

IDD Isn’t Dependent on the Reputation of the Practitioner

One of the biggest selling points for IDD Therapy, and a benefit that many clinics really appreciate, is that it isn’t solely dependent on the reputation of the practitioner.

Perhaps you have a wonderful physiotherapist on your team that everyone wants to book with as, through word-of-mouth, everyone has come to believe they are simply the best in their field in their location.

But then one day they up and leave and take those ‘magic hands’ with them. You are left without your ‘star’ and clients start looking elsewhere for treatment. As owner of the practice, it’s back to the drawing board to find a replacement which could be a long process, often involving a great deal of trial and error.

The benefit of IDD Therapy is that it is not dependent on the reputation of the practitioner administering the treatment. So, while you are tied up treating one patient, another can be benefiting from treatment at the same time with a team member.

This also means that clients don’t need to be ‘tied’ to one person, so if a team member isn’t available it’s easy to continue seamlessly to treat the patient.

Utilising Underused Capacity

Many clinics have some underused capacity that can be put to good use; this could be staff with un-booked sessions or rooms that are not fully utilised. IDD can help fill those gaps and make use of ‘voids’ in the practice.

Enhance your Clinic’s Reputation

The addition of an Accu SPINA to provide IDD Therapy can very quickly enhance a local high profile and establish your clinic and staff as the leading back pain experts in their area. I’ve seen this with all the clinics we’ve worked with. The advanced spine programme with IDD Therapy has set them apart from the competition.

IDD is now a fast-growing addition to many clinics with a good, steady uptake.  A couple of clinics in the UK already have two machines which has increased their number of treatments on offer through IDD to an average of 200 a month.

Some clinics internationally have up to six Accu SPINA machines which shows that IDD is fast becoming the regular go-to solution for the treatment of unresolved back and neck pain.

We are not quite there just yet in the UK but this is the direction we are heading. As our lives become increasingly more sedentary, we will need to find more efficient solutions for conditions that just don’t respond to exercise and manual therapy.

IDD Therapy isn’t a miracle cure-all. However, some patients can feel symptomatic relief quite quickly and that allows them to be able to get on with their lives without debilitating pain in our fast-paced society.  Others see results as they progress through the programmes, of course not all patients make improvements.  However, those that go on to have invasive treatments have the assurance that they have exhausted non-invasive treatment options.

Protect your Own Health

It’s not only the patients who can benefit from offering IDD Therapy. Practitioners from across the manual therapy profession commonly suffer with back pain or other joint issues from the years of doing a physical type of work. 

When people damage their backs, movement becomes very restrictive and that can be a death-knell for a practitioner who needs to be able to use their body and physical attributes to treat patients effectively.

While a young practitioner might have the stamina to treat 14 patients a day, that level of manual work will eventually put a huge strain on their own body and can become problematic as they age.

Problems with arthritic hands and bad backs are so common now amongst older practitioners, but I can think of at least three osteopaths who have been able to carry on working thanks to having IDD Therapy themselves.

The Accu SPINA takes the physical strain away and means that a practitioner can work longer and later in life.

We are now living in an age where many of us will have to work longer to support ourselves and generate enough resources for retirement. No-one wants to wake up in pain every day thinking ‘how on earth am I ever going to retire?’

Expanding a clinic and generating revenue streams not dependent on the owner are a clear way for clinic owners to be able to continue practicing and having a business which supports them when they no longer want to work full time.  This ensures a healthier clinic life and healthier lifestyle where the clinic owner can work because they want to, rather than because they have to.