And you don't have to watch that.
We're just going to, oh, there it is.
Look at that little fly over the beach
line from Anaheim.
All right.
I'll do the intro now.
Policy doesn't feel personal until it
shows up in your documentation,
your reimbursement,
or your ability to care for the patients
the way you believe is right.
I feel like reimbursement,
people talk about that a lot in the
hallways.
Sure do.
Amy Faria here, live from Anaheim.
Live from Anaheim.
A pitching wedge away from...
mickey's house yeah i mean i knew we
were close i went to see him the
other day i would you would you see
what would you do uh well so i'm
a disney world girl because i'm an east
coast girl okay um so i had to
do some of the classics uh like space
mountain big thunder um and i had to
do the matterhorn because we don't have
that on the east coast so that was
pretty great um and we also did pirates
of the caribbean got it again classic um
and i had to have a dole whip
A what?
A Dole Whip.
I don't know what that is.
Oh, my goodness.
You might have to go to downtown Disney
just to get one.
So it is dairy-free,
ice cream-like consistency frozen
pineapple.
Oh, Dole.
Yes.
Cool.
Dole plus Cool Whip.
Got it.
Yes, but there's no...
It's like soft serve ice cream,
but there's no dairy.
It's a fascinating substance,
and it's also delicious.
Love it.
Yeah.
All right,
so we were supposed to talk at Graham
Sessions.
We were.
Which is a secret meeting that we tell
everybody we were at.
Not really sure how that works.
It's not so much secret as it's invite
only.
Right,
and I remember I put out a video
after that, and people were like...
Well, then, oh, yeah?
What'd you guys solve?
And I'm like, I don't know, man.
It was a meeting.
We're not launching a missile here.
We're just trying to change the things
that you want us to change.
It's just funny when people...
I get it, though.
People, this is important.
It is.
And it's a pain in the ass.
It's not right.
Yep.
But I've never, I said this last night,
maybe after a couple of drinks,
I've never heard anybody at APTA say,
if you join APTA,
we're just going to solve all your
problems.
Like, they don't say that.
Correct.
You say, like,
we are working to solve the problems.
If you join us.
We'll collaborate with you.
That would be great.
And that would give us more people to
help solve the problem.
And also we depend on you sometimes to
bring the problems to us.
What are you seeing in clinical practice?
What are you seeing in payment or lack
thereof?
We need those boots on the ground.
Not only do we need your grassroots when
it matters,
but also we need to know what you're
experiencing.
Yes.
Some of us aren't in the clinic.
And I never knew this enough.
I've been in the profession for ten years.
I never realized there was so much
difference from state to state.
Very much.
So much different from state to state.
I had no idea.
So which puts back on the importance of
being involved in a local state chapter
level.
All right,
what's a problem or topic that you're most
excited to see?
This is going back to when we were
at Graham Sessions.
What were the things,
because now we can ask like post-post,
what were you most looking forward to see?
What did you see and left excited?
What were you lacking?
What were you like, oh,
I wish there was more about that?
I was super excited to see us talking
about the cost of education.
And I felt like in a different way
than I had heard us talk about it
before.
It was very honest.
It was very vulnerable from all sides.
They brought a student who graduated
twenty minutes before that,
and she read her receipts.
Yes,
we had a student with receipts from her
loans.
We had academic administrators.
We had deans who are physical therapists.
We had really the people at the heart
of those decisions.
Except that, we also discussed
They don't really get to make those
decisions.
Those people, we were on a set.
We were at APTA headquarters on a
Saturday.
People making those decisions were not
there.
They're in a different...
I feel like they're in darkened rooms in
large leather chairs.
Yeah,
but what I walked away from that
conversation with was hope that...
that the folks that are academic
administrators who are physical therapists
are starting to push and are starting to
have those conversations.
I was really excited to hear that
collaborative discussion and some kind of
like, all right,
we're all in this together and we're gonna
work through this together, right?
And that collaboration really is, I mean,
you and I were saying in the beginning,
right?
Like that's really what we need.
I see an enormous opportunity for us to
band together as a profession to advocate
against, um,
what the department of education has,
you know, put in their proposed rule.
Right.
And that had just come out like just
before, just come out right before that.
And, and you know,
That's not necessarily the way to lower
the cost of education.
That's going to create a bottleneck,
right?
That's going to cut us off.
So to hear folks talking about, okay,
well, what are some other strategies,
right?
We had an administrator talking about how
he actually has some control over the cost
of the PT education.
costs, right?
The PT program costs.
And can we inspire more folks to have
those discussions and push back in those
negotiations?
What can we do to support that?
That was what I walked away with is
that there was some hope there.
And I think we all felt it in
the room.
And you're right, though.
We didn't say here's the one single
solution.
Right.
That's not what that's about.
But it's about inspiring people to walk
away from that and go, OK,
what can I do to contribute?
What policy change needs to happen?
What advocacy strategy do we need?
And I see an excitement to get behind,
you know,
getting the DOE to change their minds on
that proposed rule.
And then where do we go with the
momentum from that?
We decide what that next step is together.
It was good to see so many people
angry at the same thing.
Right, for once.
You're going to see people angry.
Yeah.
It was a little known thing.
When you see photos online of people going
to their state chapters,
I went to Hill Day in DC.
What you don't see a lot of times
is the day before that, APTA trains you.
Absolutely.
So it's like, hey, I'm here at DC.
I'm going to knock on my congressman's
door.
What do I do?
They train you.
Absolutely.
You're empowered to go in there and
advocate for specific, you know,
specific policies, specific changes that,
you know,
APTA wants to see or that is really
important to patients in your area of
practice or in your state.
because you're talking to them about what
your patients are seeing or what you as
a PT and PTA,
for me in New Hampshire,
what are we seeing?
What are our patients seeing?
That's what we go to the Hill to
talk about.
But APTA does empower you to how to
have that conversation,
how to hug a porcupine,
because let's face it, it's not that easy.
I like the visual.
What wasn't on the docket that you were
like, oh man, I mean, listen,
you can't put fifty things.
You can put ten things, maybe.
What wasn't on the list that you're like,
I hope it's there next year,
I hope we'll talk about it before next
year?
Yeah, so next year,
I really think we need to talk about
AI.
We need to talk about technology and
healthcare.
Because it's listening right now.
And also, like,
we're doing some incredible work at APTA.
You know, our first network,
we have the new AI task force.
There's going to be a report back to
the House of Delegates, you know,
the end of this year or the beginning
of next year.
That's the perfect time.
Next year's Graham Sessions,
perfect time to say, okay,
we've got all this information.
We've got all this data.
What are the people in this room going
to do about it?
What are we going to inspire all of
the people outside of this room to do
about it?
I really think that's the direction we
should go in.
It's everywhere.
It's being whispered about.
And people were surprised it wasn't on the
list this year.
Someone said, did you go a year before?
Someone said it was on the list then.
Yeah.
Okay.
Yeah, but in more of a conceptual way,
right?
And now we've got a lot more of
it in practice.
Oh, it's not.
Yeah.
It's there.
Agreed, a hundred percent.
What do you do when it comes?
I'm like, my man,
people are using it on label or off
label, whether in workflows,
you might as well lean into it.
Absolutely.
Yep.
And have the right guardrails and policies
and protections in place to make sure
you're using it the right way.
Yeah.
Well, we are live at CSM.
Fifteen,
sixteen thousand of our colleagues here.
It's fantastic.
But mathematically,
there's a lot more people who aren't here.
Yep.
What would you say to someone who has
never been or hasn't been in a while?
And next year, you know,
I don't want to end up and this
CSM in Anaheim yet,
but we're going back to the East Coast.
We're going absolutely dilly dilly in
Philly Philly next year.
What would you say to someone of why
they should come next year,
why they should make it a point to
come next year?
Yeah,
so all of the folks that I run
into that are here for the first time
are saying to me,
I had no idea how awesome this is.
and how much I was going to feel
like I was with my people.
Because in our small clinics,
for a long time in my clinical practice,
I was the only PT onsite.
I had to go to APTA to find
my community because it wasn't coming to
me.
And so I think for me,
that's what CSM is.
this is where my people are.
I feel so at home here with everyone.
And so what I would love is for
everybody to be able to experience that.
And yeah, I mean,
the beauty of CSM is that it moves
around.
So, you know,
maybe flying six hours across the country
from Boston is not your jam.
But, you know,
driving from Boston to Philly,
like you can maybe swing that, right?
And it's great.
You're on the board of directors.
Maybe you slip this in there.
I like the, I wrote a headline recently.
or a tagline for CSM,
see future versions of yourself
everywhere.
Because that's really what, like,
it really is cool watching.
They don't walk alone.
They walk in packs of at least five,
which is students, five or more.
And they are sort of like doing this.
But I remember mine ten years ago here.
And I described it as it's a circus
with eighteen circuses in it.
the expo hall is one thing,
but then you're walking around the
sessions and you're just like, wow,
get a watch.
You don't hurt your neck.
Cause it just keeps spinning around.
It's, it's really inspiring.
And also, um, you know, for, for me,
APTA service is like what makes me feel
connected to the PT that I am because
my job is in admin, right?
It's not in direct clinical care anymore.
Um, but everyone I have encountered, um,
in my APTA service has either opened a
door for me or showed me an opportunity.
And I would not be a board member
if not for all of the people that
mentored me and guided me along the way.
So this is also where you find those
people that are going to hold your hand
and say, hey, come along with me.
Come to this meeting.
Come to the business meeting for your
section.
Most of the time they're just going,
they're pushing.
Go, go.
Well, the funny part is like,
I was talking to Melanie Brennan from
Minnesota, and she said,
I was a student usher at something in
Minnesota, and I was a runner.
And how cool is it?
she was probably shoved into that position
by someone.
Now she's the president of the state.
That's got to feel full circle.
It's amazing.
Actually,
I was at the student networking breakfast
yesterday talking to a student who had
applied to be an usher in Portland,
Oregon this summer.
She's still waiting to see, but she said,
even if I don't get to be a
student usher,
I'm going to figure out how to get
to Oregon and be in the gallery for
House of Delegates because she's already
figured out that's where I'm going to find
my community.
She's lamenting
graduating right she's a third year
student she's like I'm gonna be done I'm
gonna this community that I've been a part
of my school community I have to walk
away from that and and she's like you
know I'm a little nervous about it and
and you know we got to talk about
like all right well what's cool is that
you're gonna find your next APTA community
right you're gonna find that next group of
people that that are gonna support you and
lift you up and you know when you've
had a hard day you can send someone
a text and say man this was a
rough one right no the same gripes
and then gone through those days and like
sometimes you're not looking for a
solution you're looking to pitch it
someone who knows what you're going
through yeah and then just nod and go
okay well now i'll go back to solving
right we're all in this together yeah
every episode we do we have a parting
shot um maybe we're just watching a
walking vagina walk by
As one does.
As it happens here at CSM.
Good.
Your parting shot.
What's one thing that you're super focused
on the APTA doing or changing before
you're done on the board of directors?
There's something that you're like,
there's my BHAG, my big, hairy,
audacious goal.
I am super duper excited about the
strategic framework in as much as it is
inspiring our technological advancement.
So I got to talk about remote therapeutic
monitoring twice yesterday in two
different sessions.
I am obsessed with it.
I am so excited about the opportunities
that we have and knowing that APTA is
embracing that opportunity along with us
and supporting us in those technological
advances and making it part of the
strategic framework,
saying the quiet part out loud,
we are going to do this together.
Yeah.
That I'm so excited to be a part
of making that happen.
Love that.
Amy, appreciate your time here.
We're doing a little quick hits here at
CSN,
but you probably have forty seven things
you need to do now as part of
the board of directors.
Appreciate your time now.
Yeah, thank you.