Addressing Health Care Access Disparities Through a Public Health Approach to Physical Therapist Practice

As the field evolves as a doctoring profession, the role and scope of physical therapist practice must also grow to meet important and urgent public health needs. Scalable, population-level interventions must be prioritized to the same degree as tailored, individual-level care. Drawing from public health frameworks, this perspective proposes an approach to population-level physical therapist care delivery that aims to mitigate disease and disability and improve health outcomes by expanding access, decreasing cost, and improving quality of care for those facing the greatest health disparities. Application of these frameworks prompts the development of novel approaches to rehabilitation service delivery to advance twin goals of promoting access to care and reducing health disparities. This paper describes how a population health framework and public health approach can be used to support necessary evolution and innovation within the field of physical therapy and to improve rehabilitation service delivery. Rapid developments in the digital and virtual health space have created a unique opportunity for physical therapists to lean into a new vision of their role as clinicians within the broader health ecosystem. This paper will provide clinicians with a broader perspective of physical therapist expertise and describe opportunities for the development and application of a physical therapist skill set toward driving population health outcomes. Real-world examples will guide clinicians to consider opportunities in their own practice for implementing this public health approach and potentially addressing various contributors to persistent health disparities.