Why One Physical Therapy Provider Thinks Hybrid Care is Key

Band Connect — a five year-old physical therapy startup born out of the University of Cincinnati — is having a pretty exciting summer.

For starters, the company is making good progress on its clinical research efforts to validate its clinician-driven hybrid therapy model, having submitted five abstracts in the past two months to various orthopedic and physical therapy conferences and expecting to present the full manuscripts by the end of the year. During this same 60-day period, the startup also reported increasing its patient enrollment by 40% and hiring nine new clinicians. And just last week, Band Connect announced a partnership with Complete Care, the largest injury care provider in Florida with more than 27 offices.

In the view of the startup’s cofounders, Rohit Nayak and Abby McInturf, Band Connect is taking a fundamentally different approach than other players in the physical therapy marketplace. 

Nayak met McInturf when he was an entrepreneur in residence at the University of Cincinnati’s  1819 Innovation Hub and she was an undergraduate student. She was originally working on a class project to reduce concussions among women soccer players, but the pair recognized that the technology she was developing had applications in physical therapy and musculoskeletal rehabilitation.

“There’s a lot that’s happening with the PT market, and there’s clearly a lot of problems as it relates to outcomes — which we believe has a direct influence on the overall cost, which is why other vendors are trying to address the cost model itself through disintermediation and direct-to-patient or direct-to-employer solutions. But we think we can address the root cause by helping the clinician virtualize their presence in the clinician in the patient’s home,” Nayak, who serves as the company’s CEO, said in an interview.

Band Connect provides a connect platform that allows physical therapists to extend the in-clinic experience beyond the walls of their practice. The startup employs a hybrid model, so its technology is used both in the clinic and in the home, Nayak explained.

This model centers on the company’s sensor-enabled exercise equipment, which tracks patients’ movements and uploads the data into their physical therapist’s workflow. The equipment primarily consists of resistance bands — which are often used during in-clinic physical therapy sessions — that have sensors integrated into their handles.

“We have a software application that the clinicians can assign exercises on, as well as see all the data. On the patient side of the application, the patients are actually getting real-time feedback from their physical therapist based on what they did. So the idea is that this is a clinically validated solution, which is why we’re going through clinical trials,” McInturf stated.

She pointed out that Band Connect is a condition-specific platform, currently focusing on upper extremity conditions like mid-back and neck rehabilitation. The company is also developing a prototype for lower extremities, which would support ankle, hip and knee conditions, she added.

Nayak added that he believes this equipment is extracting data points “that nobody has ever captured before.” 

With traditional physical therapy models, measurements are only taken in the clinic setting. Through the use of Band Connect’s sensor-enabled resistance bands, physical therapists can track their patient’s compliance, range of motion and strength progression in the home setting on an ongoing basis, Nayak said. Physical therapists can also give their patients feedback in real time, allowing them to quickly correct the user’s form or tell them to slow down.

Having this equipment in the home not only helps physical therapists get a more accurate view of their patients’ progression, but it also improves compliance, he stated.

“The majority of physical therapy patients drop out after three or four weeks, but we’re getting somewhere in the range of 15 weeks for the duration of therapy using our technology to date. Another characteristic of engagement is patient no-show rates — at a clinic, these are typically 12-20%, but we’re seeing no show rates of 1% or less,” Nayak declared.

Higher compliance leads to better outcomes, McInturf added.

The typical case with a physical therapy patient is that they get sent home with a dozen paper handouts explaining exercises that they’ll only do a handful of times or maybe not at all, she said.

“Patients have no idea if they’re doing it right, there’s no accountability, and they’re worried they’re going to hurt themselves. Often, they will inevitably stop doing their exercises. Whereas with Band Connect, there’s a lot more accountability because the clinician is able to interact with what the patient has done outside of the clinic. And through the real time feedback, they can know what they’re doing right and wrong,” McInturf remarked.

She believes Band Connect shouldn’t be grouped together with companies that offer pure virtual physical therapy, such as Hinge Health or Sword Health.

McInturf and Nayak have always believed that their hybrid physical therapy model was unique, as it blends both the in-clinic and at-home rehabilitation experience.

“Physical therapists are very highly trained individuals — they’re trained on hands on muscle manipulation, and being in the clinic and seeing patients is really important. We essentially integrate into that care delivery pathway. It’s in a way that physical therapists can do what they’re trained to do, with us leveraging our technology to augment the rest of the experience,” McInturf explained. “Physical therapists and their ability to do their jobs is at the core of what we’re doing — we’re enabling them to expand their outreach outside of the clinic.”

The co-founders believe the startup’s unique hybrid model will help it stand out as it navigates the journey to closing out its seed fundraising round.

Photo: SDI Productions, Getty Images