President’s Message
(December 20, 2021)
A Message From the President
As we approach the close of 2021, I want to thank each of you for your commitment to our profession by being a member of APTA Indiana. Your membership in our professional association has allowed APTA Indiana to advance the scope of physical therapy practice this past year. Advancing our profession directly impacts the breadth of care we can provide to our patients and clients.
During the 2021 Indiana Legislative Session, the profession of physical therapy experienced positive change with some important legislative wins:
- Indiana joins 32 other states as a member of the Physical Therapy Compact
- Physical Therapists can now provide physical therapy via telehealth.
However, not being able to impact the decision, allowing Physical Therapist Assistants (PTAs) to also provide physical therapy services via telehealth, was unfortunate. In response to this, the APTA Indiana State Legislative Committee has been working with other healthcare partners to support legislation in the 2022 session that will add the PTA to the list of providers who can provide care via telehealth. In addition, the focus of Physical Therapy (PT) Day at the Statehouse on January 26, 2022, will be to bring PTA Students and clinicians to the Statehouse to share their support of this legislation. PT Day at the Statehouse will also be a time for clinicians from around the state to meet with key legislators. We will be reaching out in the near future to ask constituents of key legislators to join us at the Statehouse on January 26, as we continue to build critical grassroots connections.
During the APTA Indiana Board of Directors meeting in November, a motion was passed to create a Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) Committee. As we look to the future of our profession and the care we provide to our patients and clients, we need to be intentional in expanding who we are. If you want to be part of that forward-thinking group of members, please email info@aptaindiana.org. We would like to start forming this group early in 2022 so please respond by January 10, 2022.
As we look ahead to 2022, I am really excited to share that we will have an ‘in person’ Spring Meeting on Saturday, April 30, at Bradford Woods. Drew Contreras, PT, DPT, APTA Vice President of Clinical Integration and Innovation will be our speaker. If you have not been to Bradford Woods yet, or heard Drew speak, this is a meeting that you need to attend! Registration will open in mid-February.
In closing, I again want to say thank you for making a difference in the lives of our patients with the care you provide every day. In particular, I am thinking about those of you who are working in our hospitals with record admissions, as the pandemic continues to surge. The impact you have in helping those impacted by COVID is immeasurable. I wish you a window of rest and recovery during this Holiday Season.
Happy Holidays!
Emily
Emily Slaven, PT, PhD
President, APTA Indiana
slavene@uindy.edu