Physio support website

Hi all,

I am studying for my Masters degree and am looking to build a website to help support the physiotherapy patient and also to support the work of physiotherapists.
I currently have a small team of physios with whom I am working with to try to ascertain exactly whom the clients most likely to use the site are, what features will be useful to the client and what features would be useful in supporting the physios.

The idea is preliminary at the moment if anyone has any ideas or thoughts whatsoever on this matter then I would be very grateful. I have also posted a questionnaire that is available to complete online, if anybody would be kind enough to complete one! It can be found at:

www.my3q.com/go.php?url=iankennedy/86448

I am also having difficulties in understanding how the private physio sector and private insurance interact. If anyone has any knowledge of how the referral system works then I would be very grateful. For example, is the client always told which hospital or clinic they should go to for treatment? If anyone has any knowledge, or knows where to find any figures on what kind of a percentage of private patients hold health insurance, this would be much appreciated.

Thanks in anticipation!

[Physiobase]

Hi Ian,

thanks for your post. I have looked at your questionnaire and it does not really seem to ask questions that relate to what you are trying to do. If you want to get demographic data like that you are asking then ask any national physiotherapy association. They, and many registration boards, ask the type of questions you are asking on a yearly basis. Perhaps that would be your fastest route to this information at a larger level.

On a partient support front, I would suggest using various web keyword analysis tools to find out what the public are searching for in relation to health. This will give you your answer for what the patient is looking for. You see you need to ask them, not us!

On a physio support forum, well that's what we do. So please don't ask for that type of advice from this forum as really we would view that as a direct conflict and fragmentation of what we are trying to make a collective environment. There is already to much fragmentation and not enough collaboration.

Might I ask if you are yourself a physiotherapist?

best of luck and I hope the above comments assist your search. 8o

Hi,

Thanks for the reply. I have looked at many different routes to try and collect this information. Ive found it very difficult to actually get access to patients or previous patients. Hospitals and clinics were reluctant to let me have access to any patient, even in the waiting room. Any suggestions on how to get some kind of contact with patients would be gratefully accepted? (Is there such things as patient forums??)

Yes, the questionnaire does try to gain quite alot of demographic data, the kind of data that I thought had not been collected. I had great difficulty just trying to source waiting times for the NHS in the UK, data I thought would be readily available.

I do not wish to post anything that may be unsuitable or not in the interests of the people here. The project I am trying to create will be a website or a piece of software that I hope will be available to all physios to help them and their patients. The aim is for the patients to feel that there are methods of support or advice that are offered by their practitioners outside of their treatment hours.

I am not a physiotherapist myself and so am trying to get to know the area as well as I can to understand how physios may be able to offer patients more support outside of their sessions.

Thanks!