The Prehab Guys: Leading the Charge in Preventive Physical Therapy

Show Notes

In this episode of the Dr. JJ Thomas Podcast, I have the pleasure of sitting down with Dr. Arash from the Prehab Guys, who are revolutionizing the world of physical therapy with their proactive approach to patient care. We dive deep into the importance of prehabilitation and how the Prehab Guys have made significant strides in making comprehensive, preventive care accessible to the public. Join us as we explore the journey that led to the creation of the Prehab Guys, the challenges they've overcome, and the impact they're making in the field of physical therapy. It's an enlightening conversation filled with insights that both patients and healthcare professionals can benefit from.

Get A Free Copy Of My Book:
5 Things You MUST Do to Build a Successful Cash-Based PT Practice
This quick, easy-to-read guide is your no-BS steps to what really works in building a Cash-Based Physical Therapy business.
👉 https://bit.ly/CashPTebook
For more on our in person Physical Therapy continuing education classes, check out our Primal University 🎓 https://bit.ly/primaluniversityeducation

What is The Dr. JJ Thomas Podcast?

Welcome to The Dr. JJ Thomas Podcast! Here I'll be talking all things physical therapy, raw and unplugged, giving you the unfiltered insights you've been searching for in your cash-based physical therapy business. If you're caught in the grind of the traditional model, swamped with paperwork, or feeling like you're not reaching your full potential as a physical therapist, this podcast was created just for you.

Dr. Arash: 00:00

We've we've made the mistake in the past of having programs that are, you know, what we thought was the best possible program, but it was too long and compliance dropped after 20, 30 minutes. So we try to limit it towards that time frame now. So that way, the goal is to get them to do the routine, not just to have the best program. Welcome to the doctor JJ Thomas podcast.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 00:23

Hi, everyone. Welcome to the doctor JJ Thomas podcast. I'm doctor JJ Thomas. Very happy to have my new friend, doctor Arash here with me today from The Prehab Guys. We're in for a treat.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 00:35

If you guys don't know The Prehab Guys already, what I can tell you about them is in the world of PT where therapists were just starting to realize and recognize and have a push for, a proactive approach for our patients and getting out of that reactive phase of treatment. The prehab guys leveled it up. They put it out there for the public to enjoy and take advantage of, and have done such a great job of just awareness of the importance of prehab and proactive treatments that they've been an inspiration to me. And I know a lot of other therapists, really admire what you guys do. So thank you, Arash, for being here.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 01:16

I wanted to

Dr. Arash: 01:16

Thank you for having me on.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 01:17

Oh, my pleasure. And, if if it's okay with you, Arash, before we get into, like, the segment, if you could just fill in any gaps for me on your personal background and, really what led you to the journey with RehabGuys.

Dr. Arash: 01:32

Yeah. Totally. So me, my Mike and Craig are the 3 founders of the Prehab Guys. We actually started this platform during PT school. It was a time that we noticed the information online was very poor.

Dr. Arash: 01:45

And during our clinical rotations, we noticed a lot of people actually looking online for whatever ache or pain that they may have and figuring out that they're actually led down the wrong path. And it's interesting. Like, up to 90% of people actually look up their symptoms online Yeah. Before they even come into their to their health care provider. And so we real we realize that people are led down the wrong path, and that's a big problem here because there's such a long delay in seeing the health care provider that you wanna see because the health care system is so backed up.

Dr. Arash: 02:16

So, that that's one main piece to to drive this. And when we started, we didn't have a a big vision or a big goal. A lot of it just came down to let's just post on Instagram one post at a time and make sure that we stayed consistent with that regardless of how busy we got. And we did that for a couple months and realized we had some traction. And, not until after PT school did we actually wanna turn it into a business where, you know, we started trying to monetize off of it, creating programs, eventually creating our app.

Dr. Arash: 02:48

So that's that's the this process in which how we got started and now it's turned into a business of over 30 people, which is great because we are only able to do the things we're doing because we have so many other skills involved aside from the the skills that us 3 brought to the table.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 03:05

100%. That's when I look at you guys and what you're doing, it's like, it's really cool because you have this you have this structure that allows for the 1 on 1 attention, with your patients as much as possible and then capitalizes on their ability to take their own accountability with the exercises that you guys have done such a beautiful job of prescribing through your app and through online programming. And it's just really cool. The other thing about that though is, like, I'm not an easy sell in terms of product when people, you know, people are like, you know, I look I click on things like, oh, try this tendinopathy program or have rotator cuff tendinitis. Try this, and I'll look at it.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 03:43

And more than half the time, it's crap. It's like very basic exercises that are not gonna get them better than 50% on their own. And when I clicked on your guys' stuff, I was like, oh, oh, alright. These guys are doing it. So that is really cool.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 04:00

And, so just congratulations to you guys for putting out not only content, but really, really great content that people can use, which brings me to and my next question, which is I I'm curious. I'm sure their listeners are too. I'm curious to hear more about your particular, journey into, like, other things that influence your your approach. And not just your approach, but what I see is the standards out of your product. Like, you know, I feel like you don't just come up with those standards by going to PT school and and deciding it.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 04:32

Like, I feel like there's a story there. And I I did happen to read there's I'm curi I read about your, maybe collegiate soccer career having a having a halt due to a very severe ankle injury. And I I couldn't help but ask myself, did that have any influence on your, on your standards for your patients and your product?

Dr. Arash: 04:52

Yeah. That's a great question. And, yeah, it it definitely did. So I'll I'll dive into that. Basically, during college, this is before I decided on PT school.

Dr. Arash: 05:02

I had a career ending ankle injury. It was an eversion sprain, so my deltoid ligaments were sprained, not as common. And so healing for that just took a bit longer. Went to PT, and, you know, PT did what it needed to to get me out of pain. I even had some injections throughout the process.

Dr. Arash: 05:18

But the current health care system doesn't set people up for success long term. It got me out of pain, but then when I got back to running and playing sports again, I realized that I still have that that issue, and I never fully got to that back to sport, return to sport progression. I got out of pain. I was able to do daily things, but daily things were not good enough for me being a collegiate athlete. And so I realized there was a big gap in the health care system from, yeah, getting out of sick care, getting out of pain to, like, you know, optimizing my health for what I need to do.

Dr. Arash: 05:55

So that was a gap I noticed early on, and that kinda led me down towards the the PT route. And I I I've always been interested in activity and health and wellness, and, exercising has always been a very important thing to me. And if I can help people get back to exercise and pain free, I feel like that's a a great valuable tool I can bring to other people because I find a lot of value in it. Mhmm. So that's what led me down the PT route.

Dr. Arash: 06:20

And then, after school or during the clinical rotations and after school, I realized, how big of a problem just a lack of information was, accessible for people online. And so now there's, like, this this idea of, my what I've learned in the real world has also applied to what I use online for the online content that we create. So we're trying to make it as easy as possible for people to, understand what's going on online, but not make it too simplified where it's inaccurate. That's where it becomes tricky.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 06:54

Yes.

Dr. Arash: 06:54

Because there are people that do that, and and oversimplification can actually lead to more harm than good. And social media is a platform. It's very hard to to do that. There's not much room for nuances. But Yeah.

Dr. Arash: 07:07

Yeah. So we're trying to make it where, you know, people have the tools, to get out of not just out of pain, but also get back to what they want to do pain free indefinitely and help the therapist also with, having access to those tools because the current health care system is not allowing us setting us up for success. So, that's where that comes from.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 07:28

Right. I feel like there's a lot for me to unpack in that, and and I have lots of questions. I'm gonna try to not bombard you with all of them at once. But, one of the things that came to thought when you were talking is that struggle, that obstacle that you faced with your own ankle injury. And and I'm it's it's interesting for me to hear you say that because that was at such a pivotal time, it seems, in your life because it was a it was a collegiate you know, that's your job as a collegiate athlete.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 07:55

That feels like your job. You You feel like you can't do your job. So there's a lot of a lot oftentimes, I see in my athletes a lot of emotional, frustration tied to that. And then there, you're in PT school and still seeing the gap. And then kudos to you for taking that gap and and doing something with it.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 08:10

But but I still see this again on patients that I've received who I consider it failed treatment elsewhere because they have exactly that. Like somewhere along the line, they got the message that 70% was good enough or 75% was good enough. And, you know, I just I have a really hard time with that and clearly you do too. So I guess the Pat, the question I'm trying to unpack is how did you being I don't even think you were a therapist at the time. Right?

Dr. JJ Thomas: 08:40

So when did you feel like you were able to regain most of that in the in the midst of that obstacle, in terms of your actual ankle recovery.

Dr. Arash: 08:52

So getting like, at what point was I able to get back to, sport based on rehab, like, more of the high level rehab?

Dr. JJ Thomas: 09:00

Exactly. Yeah.

Dr. Arash: 09:02

Yeah. I would say I would say throughout, my pre PT curriculum, I learned enough, and my mom is also physical therapist as well. That's cool. That's always helpful. So during that process, I probably learned enough to where I was able to do higher level rehab and do the things that I needed to do.

Dr. Arash: 09:21

Because for me, it was like, there was low level rehab exercises and then sport, and that was it. And I had this this this whole gap in between. And so, that's what I needed to fill and progress through. And I think throughout that pre PT curriculum, I I learned enough to be able to do that, but the problem is I learned it at a point where it was too late for me to go back to college soccer.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 09:43

Absolutely.

Dr. Arash: 09:43

Honestly, yeah. Which honestly is for the best, like and I think that it you never know if something is bad or good in the moment. It seems so devastating in my whole future and career with sports and my identity had to shift because I always thought of myself as an athlete. But, looking back on it, that that timing, like you mentioned, was pivotal because, I was trying to figure out my career and allowing that injury to happen required me to take a step back and reassess how I wanna progress forward. And so that's that's what allowed me to get into PT.

Dr. Arash: 10:15

So, yeah. And after that, you know, during PT school also, like, there's so many different things that that you learn with all these different injuries, and you just try on yourself as a case study, just to see what what it feels like, what works, what doesn't work. So that that always helped as well. But, but, yeah, I've I've gotten a lot better, forever since. Thanks for asking.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 10:36

Yeah. No. And I think that's why I ask is because, really what I was trying to unpack for the audience is is that even when you've been stifled in the process of rehab, what I've seen is that it it all honestly, almost doesn't usually, it doesn't matter how far out it is. If you start giving the body the right input, it will respond. And I felt like that's probably what happened with you.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 10:59

Like, once you started learning the tools yourself, and based on your own perseverance and and good instincts and a great support system, it sounds like, my guess is that you are still an athlete. And I thought that was I thought that was something that would be cool to share, mostly for my patients and therapists that have seen someone who it does feel stifled by recovery and feels like I'll never get better. When yet, if they just start doing the right things with the right people with the right input, they will. So that's that's what I was trying to share. Yeah.

Dr. Arash: 11:30

Yeah. Well, what what about yourself? I'm sure you've shared it on the podcast before, but what what's well, was there a trigger for you to get into PT?

Dr. JJ Thomas: 11:38

This is a funny story. I I was 14 when I got into PT. I was I went to school early. I graduated high school. I was actually just, I turned I was just 16 when I graduated high school.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 11:49

So I was I went to school early. I was a I was an eager learner always. And, and when I was 14, I was, like, I was working out of a gym that had a PT school PT not PT school. PT clinic attached to it, and you had to walk through the PT clinic. And every time I would go to work out with the team, I'm, like, walking through, and I'm, like, that's pretty cool.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 12:08

That's really cool. You know? And I kept. And by, like, the 5th day of that, I was like, I think I might wanna do that. I'm 14.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 12:14

I can't know what I wanna do. So I just I was like, well, I'll start volunteering and see how it goes. And I fell in love with it right away. I was a hard worker, so my my who turned into my mentor who owned the clinic took me under his wing and taught me everything he knew. And, that's that's my story.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 12:29

And I've never had a real severe injury until, actually, just over a year ago, I tore my ACL in jiu jitsu. And, and it was honestly one of the best experience I've I've had because being I've I've always been empathetic, and I think I've been able to relate to my patients. But it's a whole another level when you've been the patient. So, so yeah. Thanks for asking.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 12:52

I don't know if I've

Dr. Arash: 12:53

shared that on the podcast actually. So, interesting. Is the ACL recovery going going well?

Dr. JJ Thomas: 12:59

Great. I just told I'd actually work with, the doc who did my surgery a lot, and I saw him

Dr. Arash: 13:04

last night. And I

Dr. JJ Thomas: 13:04

was like, I did sprints on Saturday. And it was, like, one of those sprints that actually felt like I wasn't dying, and I had some good form. And I was like, this is so fun. I'm conquering this. You know?

Dr. JJ Thomas: 13:15

So, thank you. Yeah. It's all good. And I'm back to jujitsu, hoping to ski this year. All good.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 13:22

Yeah. It's good. I've had I had good support too. Yeah. So anyway but back to you guys.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 13:31

The other thing I wanted to pull out of you was a little bit more about the prehab concept. Because as I said in the intro, I feel like I know I have my own preconception about what it means what prehab means, and I know all my friends do. But I do feel like you guys really own prehab, and and I'd love to hear your perspective on on what what it is to you.

Dr. Arash: 13:55

Totally. It's such a such a great question because you'll ask. And on our podcast, we ask each guest at the end of the podcast what prehab means to them.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 14:03

Oh, that's awesome.

Dr. Arash: 14:04

Different things where yeah. You get different answers based on who they are, their background, their career. Mhmm. And, you know, historically, rehab is thought of as doing PT exercises prior to surgery. That's, like, been, like, the the first place that probably prehab got popular.

Dr. Arash: 14:23

Now when we talk about prehab and the way that we look at prehab is much more broad than that. I would say the intent behind what you're doing is what defines if it's prehab or not. Like, you could be doing the same rehab exercise for your shoulder. You're doing this 90 90 ex excellent rotation for building up your rotator cuff for getting out of shoulder pain. Now that's rehab, but you could be doing it for preventing shoulder injuries.

Dr. Arash: 14:47

Now that's prehab. So it's the idea of taking a proactive approach to your health, and that's what we're trying to push is, you know, the same exercise routine could be done for preventing issues like diabetes, obesity, etcetera, and that's now considered prehab. So the idea and the notion that we're we're trying to push is making sure that, this health care system that we have right now is so focused on sick care, and we want to push this health and wellness prevention aspect aspect of taking control of your health because taking control of your health is not just fixing issues after the fact. And so if we provide some tools and education and, you know, we know that the most important thing is just to move and stay active and exercise. Like, the perfect routine is is is great, but all you need to do is just do something to mitigate the risk of a lot of these other issues down the road.

Dr. Arash: 15:40

Right. So we're trying to make, taking a proactive approach to your health easier and accessible for individuals. But we still know that most people enter our platform because they are trying to get out of pain. Yeah. And that's perfectly fine because that's oftentimes a trigger towards creating change.

Dr. Arash: 16:01

Like, when I had my injury, like, we were talking about, I would not have created that career shift because there was no reason for me to otherwise. Right. But if you have an injury, now you need to take action because there's something that's limiting you from you doing what you wanna do. It's that pain and discomfort. And it may be only getting worse if you continue to push through it.

Dr. Arash: 16:20

So you have to take a step back, reassess, and then move forward the correct direction. Oftentimes, that's how people enter the ecosystem and then they realize, okay. Now we can also do things on a proactive basis. So, and also on that note, I think that we live in a world where there is so much access to do it yourself. Like, you wanna build a cabinet on your wall or you wanna fix something, with your car.

Dr. Arash: 16:45

Like, there's so many YouTube videos and all these things to to help you help you do that. And so, it's something where motivated individuals are more likely to probably take that proactive approach to fixing their health and we recognize that, that, you know, this kind of stuff that we put out is not for everybody. It's for people that are willing and motivated enough to do it themselves. Because we know that with PT, a lot of times, the the hardest part is actually to get someone just to stay compliant with their exercises. But that's the big difference.

Dr. Arash: 17:16

And are is your is your clinic cash based?

Dr. JJ Thomas: 17:18

Yeah. All cash based. Yeah. And so we have less of a hard time with that. Like, we people, if they're gonna pay for us, they're you know?

Dr. JJ Thomas: 17:24

And I I actually was gonna say, I bet I bet you have a higher compliance rate because your exercises are good.

Dr. Arash: 17:30

I don't mean to be mean,

Dr. JJ Thomas: 17:31

but I'm serious. Like, people will do it if they feel a difference. And I feel like Yeah. Sometimes when people have a hard time with compliance, it's because patients are like, I've been doing this for 4 weeks, and I don't feel any different. So, I don't know.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 17:45

Totally. I don't know if you noticed that or if you even track that. Yeah.

Dr. Arash: 17:49

Yeah. No. No. Yeah. I was gonna say that the in network or sound network, like, with cash based practice, it's the motivation level is already there.

Dr. Arash: 17:55

Like, that threshold is met. Now it's just finding the plan. And to your point, each video that we have, explains how to do it, where you should feel it, and common compensations.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 18:05

I know. It's awesome.

Dr. Arash: 18:06

When you're doing an exercise, you know exactly, what you should be going for versus a lot of these other HEP platforms. Actually, that's probably the most unique part of what we do is that each exercise is so detailed to the point where a person could have no no explanation on that exercise previously and should be able to execute it perfectly. So that's that's the idea with it. And, we don't track it compared to other platforms. I don't know exactly the the compliance there, but it does it we've gotten a lot of positive feedback with that.

Dr. Arash: 18:38

So, hopefully, what you're saying is correct.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 18:40

Well, what I was gonna actually, I don't know if I told you this when I reached out to ask you to come on the podcast, but, truly, the reason I wanted to have you guys on is because, you know, my role I feel my role with the doctor JJ Thomas podcast is to introduce other physical therapists in the cash based world to tools and techniques that are going to help them succeed in the cash based practice. And when I started really looking into your programs and the quality of them and the accessibility for patients, and and I know in our model here, we are patients pay by the minute, basically. So, we are, you know, 15, 30, 45 hour blocks, and they pay based on the time they're here. If they're scheduled for 30 and we see them for 25, we pay they only pay for the time they're here. And the way that helps all of us is we use that time to really hone in on what we can do for them 1 on 1 in person, whether it's manual techniques, whether it's education, whether it's putting our hands on them in, like you said, working on form.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 19:34

But we also really help them have their own accountability and success through giving them their own exercises that they can do on their own. And so when I saw your programs, I was like, this is perfect for a cash based clinician who wants to be able to show their value when they're 1 on 1 with their patients, but still give them exercises that are really well done, really well written and programmed, minimized for compensations as you just said. And it just will help them get better results and also help their patients not not break the bank. So, for my cash based practice clinicians that are listening to this, this is a 100% why doctor Arash is on here. So you should definitely check out the programs.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 20:17

And, actually, to follow that up for my patients that are are listening to this, because we do have patients that listen as well. I was going to ask you, though, if you could give us a like, anywhere from 2 to 5 of your favorite programs for just patient overall health, like, following under the proactive you know, if we can get you're already raising awareness. But if I can get more of our listeners to actually take that proactive approach and, like, these certain programs online that you find of ours are great for overall proactive health?

Dr. Arash: 20:54

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's that's a great question. So, I would go based so and just to clarify, the app is a separate subscription than the exercise app programs.

Dr. Arash: 21:09

The big 3 are, shoulder, knee, and low back. So those 3 prehab programs are definitely the most popular, and they're actually great because not all of our programs have class style videos, but those ones are class style where we have multiple camera angles that are, on each talent, and we're taking you through the entire 20 to 30 minute routine versus you also have the option of, individual exercises as always. But this this class style video, we've gotten really positive feedback because That's great. You just airplay it on your TV or you have it on your phone and you click play, and you're just walking through the routine just like we are. And so it seems like you're there with your PT just going through the exercises.

Dr. Arash: 21:50

So

Dr. JJ Thomas: 21:50

I love that. I also love that because they know what how long they're they're dedicated to that time for. Whereas, like, some programs, I think even my program, I give them a time, but it's not you know, it should take this amount of time, but it may not. So a busy worker can say, yeah. I have 20 minutes.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 22:06

I'm gonna do this program. It takes me 20 minutes. That's cool.

Dr. Arash: 22:10

Totally. Yeah. Our workouts are also separated based on time. So if you wanna do a one off, a little, you know, ankle mobility routine or whatever it is, like, we separate them 5, 10, 15, 20. So that way you know how much time commitment you're putting into it.

Dr. Arash: 22:25

There are if you do it yourself, then there's always the time it takes to learn the exercise and watch it before you do it. But, usually, that's that's pretty accurate. And you I agree. People wanna know beforehand. And we've we've made the mistake in the past of having programs that are, you know, what we thought was the best possible program, but it was too long and compliance dropped after 20, 30 minutes.

Dr. Arash: 22:46

So we try to limit it towards that time frame now. So that way, the goal is to get them to do the routine, not just to have the best program out there.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 22:54

That's really cool. I love the way what I hear from you as a business owner is the way you're constantly evolving based on feedback from your from your audience. So that's really cool. It's probably a testament to why you guys have it together.

Dr. Arash: 23:06

Yeah. Yeah. We spend a lot of time trying to act get feedback. I mean, I even interview, users all the time just to see what what they think about it, why they joined, what the options were beforehand, because there's a lot of different options in today's day to get out of pain. And, you know, we're one of many, including other online resources or many in person resources.

Dr. Arash: 23:28

So, so it's helpful to understand that. And, yeah, we look at a lot of the data as well to to help guide that because sometimes you gotta look at bigger cohorts that just one off individuals.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 23:38

Yeah. That's awesome. How do you envision so for my clinicians that may wanna, introduce this into their cash based practice, How do you envision that for them? Like, what would be the best avenue for them?

Dr. Arash: 23:52

Yeah. Well, I would say first, make sure you have a good HEP platform like you mentioned. That's like and that's the second, membership that we have is the HEP platform, and that one's great. It's got over 4,000 exercises. Very easy easily to find the exercises that you want with the tags that we have.

Dr. Arash: 24:08

You can create templates, you know, create the programs, set up the programs as as, you can with most other HEP platforms. So I would first make sure that you're getting good patient results because that's number one goal that you have as a clinician. And then the second piece to that, we actually have a lot of clinicians that use the app, which is the the first membership I was talking about that, they they use it a lot of times for programming, which can't you can use it like that if you're unsure of maybe how to rehab an Achilles tendinopathy or rotator cuff strain or or whatever it may be. We've got a lot of programs based on diagnosis. So you you can use that, but I think that the more common approach is using it for patients after they're done with rehab.

Dr. Arash: 24:52

And this is assuming that you can't continue to work with them or, you're done with what you think you need to do and you want them to go on their own. Now at that point, you can have them go through, oh, like, a full body prehab program or Yeah. Something just to maintain what they have. And that way, you know, you have you have them on some type of plan. It's it's nice to have them.

Dr. Arash: 25:12

You can have a program that you built out, but you wanna have them progress and evolve and, the programming that we have allows for that. And that way, if there is any issue along the way, that's a program that hopefully you're also aware of. And if they have questions or concerns, they come back to you as the provider, and it's kind of a continuum of care versus saying, hey. You're on your own now. They may or may not find something that's good, and you have no idea what they're doing.

Dr. Arash: 25:38

So a lot of clinicians do like to use it in that manner

Dr. JJ Thomas: 25:42

as well. That's great. And so if they're in rehab with a patient and they wanted to you're you're saying, I just wanna clarify for my own understanding. So the first option, the app, is, like, is, like, the basically, the pre done programs that they can say, oh, this I have this person with rotator cuff tendinitis or impingement syndrome, and we can send them to this program. And more often, people do that after they're done therapy, and they just need something to stay on to to continue rehabbing or continue, improving that area on their own.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 26:16

I will say yeah. And then but if if while in, in rehab with their patients, they could also use the exercise library and create their own personalized program for them. Yes? And that would be through the second, basically, the exercise library. That's really cool.

Dr. Arash: 26:31

Exactly. The exercise library is much more common for clinicians. Like, the app, maybe 25, 30% clinicians, and those people typically use it after the fact for, like, a prehab fitness, etcetera, like, maintenance, programming standpoint. Usually, if they have a physical therapist, they're probably not doing the rehab program much. Or if they are doing the rehab program, they're doing it where the PT is kinda guiding them along the way.

Dr. Arash: 26:56

Like, I see some people in person where they're doing the program, but, like, every month they come in as a checkpoint. Like, hey. Like, I'm doing this, but, like, this one doesn't feel right. Can you

Dr. JJ Thomas: 27:05

Exactly. Do

Dr. Arash: 27:06

this with me? And so we can have we kinda have this hybrid model, so to speak, where there's a virtual program, but also in person care for for help as needed.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 27:15

That's what I pictured. And and sort of similar to what you said, like, that's how we do our 1 on 1 time. Like, I send them with the exercises. I tell them ahead of time, just as you do in your videos, beware because a lot of times people compensate like this or like this when you do the exercise. Then next week, our one of our first things on our to do list is let's go over the exercises, see how your form is real quick.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 27:34

But it still saves time to have them have that independence of doing it on their own. And we can just we clean it up within a couple weeks. Sometimes I'll even have them video me, like, go do this program, video yourself while you're doing it, send it to me, Then I can peek at it and right away be like, yeah. You're, you know, you're hit your pelvis is way forward or your or your, you know, whatever you're doing wrong. So, that's great.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 27:55

I'm excited. I'm excited for everybody listening to take advantage of this. It's really cool stuff. I have one more question for you, And it kind of it centers around this hope that I have. It seems to me like people are people are getting the message.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 28:10

They're understanding that, our bodies are an investment and that instead of, instead of frantically trying to pay our taxes 3 years later, we're we're trying to pay the rent on time and and and keep ourselves out of trouble. And and and so if that is happening, if we are a more proactive society, and certainly the people listening to this podcast probably are, How do you see, how do you see recovery evolving in the physical therapy world? And that could be it's a very broad question, I know. But I I purposely made it broad in the sense that, like, what else do you value in terms of being proactive with your care? Are you are you finding that you're talking to your parents more your parents your patients more about nutrition?

Dr. JJ Thomas: 28:57

Are you finding you're talking them more about, other recovery modalities like cryo or sauna or, you know, just just curious to pick your brain on the nonexercise side of things.

Dr. Arash: 29:10

On the nonexercise side of things. Yeah. Good question. Well well yeah. I'll I'll say this that, for the traditional health care system, it's so hard to say for that side of things because that is so dictated by insurance companies and difficult to, like, even predict because, the trend is based on what their, needs and wants are.

Dr. Arash: 29:34

So I won't talk on that point. And I think that since both of us have a cash based we can talk more about the the freedom and flexibility that we have is is cash based practice.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 29:45

Absolutely.

Dr. Arash: 29:46

So with yeah. With that, I I envision for for me, I I touch on things very generally with sleep and nutrition and, things outside of exercise. I I don't go too in-depth with it. My my plan is more to stay specific, but have that person know that I'm there not just to get out of pain. So, like, for example, this year, we're creating a prehab screen to try to get people to be more proactive.

Dr. Arash: 30:20

And this is a common thing for high level athletes and high level executives. They have these, like, general health screens that take them through, yeah, blood work. People get blood work fairly often. It's like, I guess, a screen, but they go through move and they could get these more expensive ones. People go through movement screens.

Dr. Arash: 30:37

They go through, screens assessing mobility, strength. All of these things. And so, it's very hard to predict injury, but at least if you're trying to make someone symmetrical as possible and as as strong and mobile as possible, we know that that can only help. So doing that is gonna be helpful. We're gonna launch that fairly soon.

Dr. Arash: 30:57

So that'll be exciting. Something that we I've wanted to push for a very long time.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 31:00

That's awesome.

Dr. Arash: 31:01

People yeah. People can take this more, proactive approach to their musculoskeletal health. And, you know, I'm still talking about exercise, and we know that there are so many other factors that go behind, why someone may feel pain. But this is where during that screen we haven't built it out, but we can't talk about things like, you know, sleep and nutrition and stress levels and, how their general, aches or pains may may may look at that time. So that way we know that there is some type of accountability to progressing year over year if that's how often they

Dr. JJ Thomas: 31:36

That's wonderful.

Dr. Arash: 31:36

Over the screen.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 31:37

That's really what I was looking for. Like, not necessarily I wasn't looking for you endorse cryo or or or any other modality in that sense. I really just I I I knew based on your model that you are a a person that in a group that encompasses more than just one aspect of recovery and and being proactive. So I had the sense that there was more to it than, than everything that you have out there. So thank you for sharing that.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 32:04

I think that's awesome. Screens are great, and you can pick up I always I tell my staff, like, movement tells a story. Like, you can half the time, you know how it is. Patients are like, they forget. They they're like I'm like, what are your past surgeries and injuries?

Dr. JJ Thomas: 32:17

You know? Oh, nothing. I just had one, you know, one knee injury. That was it. And then you start, like, that shoulder's a little off.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 32:22

Oh, right. I did have surgery on that. You know? And then, oh, that ankle's a little off. Oh, right.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 32:27

I did break that last year. You know? Like, the movement tells a story, people. So that's really cool.

Dr. Arash: 32:36

Yeah. It's nice to have someone take accountability, for some aspect of your life. And I get that not everyone can probably afford a prehab screen because it's not covered by insurance, but I still like the idea of making sure that, you know, you've had this previous injury like you're saying. Well, if you had that previous shoulder injury, you know what the previous risk of a shoulder injury is? Having a previous shoulder

Dr. JJ Thomas: 32:56

injury. Right. Right.

Dr. Arash: 32:57

Same thing with a lot of same thing with a lot of other injuries or diagnoses. So making sure that you take those things into consideration and Yeah. Put a little extra effort in really what we're considering is prehabbing that that body region, then in that case, you are set up for success. And that's this whole philosophy that we're trying to push is trying to make sure that you as an individual are taking accountability and seeking, you know, a good therapist and finding ways to be proactive with your health.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 33:27

Right.

Dr. Arash: 33:27

Because without that, it's just gonna continue. And I I don't know if you've seen some of the stats, but, like, you know, the average age in the US is not increasing compared to other countries, and the cost of health care per capita is by far the most expensive. Yes. And the crazy thing is even though it's so expensive, we're actually not using health care that much. We're only on average, I think it's, like, 4 visits per year that an individual does with a health care provider.

Dr. Arash: 33:54

So, like, you're paying a lot for very little and the end outcome is not very good. And we gotta do something because, you know, US is so great with many things that revolve around making money in tech and Yeah. You know, innovation. But when it comes to something as basic as, you know, lifespan or more importantly, health span, Yeah. We're we're really not doing it right,

Dr. JJ Thomas: 34:16

and we have to find

Dr. Arash: 34:17

ways to do it. So that's

Dr. JJ Thomas: 34:19

I agree. There's something you said, that I think I do think you said, I know not everyone can afford a screen. Right? But it's funny when you said that, I I I thought what people don't realize is that they can't afford not to have a screen. Like, people pay for people pay people are willing because our it's a culture.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 34:41

People are willing to pay every month out of their paycheck for insurance that then just for the sake that if they get in a car accident, that they don't have to pay a 100% for their surgeries or whatever, for their hospital care, for their helicopter ride or whatever. But but yet, they're not willing to do I'm not saying they're not willing to do, but they're not if you're not willing to take the time every day or every paycheck to pay towards your health, it's the same investment. It's just on the it's exactly what you guys are preaching and and making available to people. It's the proactive side. So, I do I think I would love to continue the path with you and hopefully collaborate more and and help the world see that, like, you can't afford not to have a screen.

Dr. Arash: 35:23

Totally. Yeah.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 35:24

Yeah.

Dr. Arash: 35:24

Yeah. The cost of not having that screen is going to definitely add up over time.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 35:29

So 100%.

Dr. Arash: 35:30

Pay for it now, and your quality of life will. Thank you.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 35:34

Yeah. Exactly. So well, this has been such a pleasure. As much as I thought, I was so excited to meet with you today, and and it was, it was really enjoyable. So thank you.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 35:44

Thank you for sharing everything and and with with our audience, but more importantly, with the world. I know I sound I'm very dramatic, but it I really believe it. Like, you're making the world a better place. So thank you.

Dr. Arash: 35:56

Yeah. Thank thank you so much. Great great questions. Great conversation. I enjoyed it.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 36:02

Thanks. Thanks, Arash. Alright. If you guys, wanna hear more from Arash, hopefully, you've already checked them out. But if you haven't, make sure you go to the it's the prehab guys.com.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 36:12

Right? Is that right, Arash?

Dr. Arash: 36:14

The prehab guys dot com.

Dr. JJ Thomas: 36:15

That is correct. Yeah. And, pretty much if you just search doctor Arash and prehab and prehab guys, you'll find them. But definitely, theprehabguys.com, and tune in for more. And we'll see you on, on social media.