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Jane Community Tips for Re-Opening and Returning to Work

June 04, 2020

It’s time for many of you to return to work, and the Jane Community is here to help. 💙

A few weeks ago, we held a roundtable with members of the Jane community who had recently returned to in-person work. We chatted about how things have been going, what has been successful, and what we think it is going to look like moving forward. If you are still in the planning phase, or the early stages of returning to in-person work, we hope you find the discussion we had and tips that were shared valuable!

You can check out the full webinar recording below as well as a summary of all resources.

Any questions, comments, or tips of your own you want to share, you can do so by joining the conversation on our Facebook page.


Note: The content in this webinar should not be used as legal advice. Our community members are simply sharing their own experiences with re-opening at the current time. We always recommend that you reach out to your local government and governing body for the most up to date rules and regulations.

Table of Contents

1. Returning to Work: Administrative Side

2. Returning to Work: Clinical Side

3. Returning to Work: Jane Account Tips

4. Roundtable Resource List for Returning to Work

Audience Poll: How Do You Feel About Re-Opening?

😌 11% Relived

😟 29% Anxious

😶 55% Both

🙃 5% Other

1. Returning to Work: Administrative Side

Communications

Now more than ever, communication with clients is incredibly important. With changes to procedures and protocols in your clinic, you need to make sure you share as much information as possible across many different channels. Your clients and your team are depending on you to help them stay informed and up to date.

All of the Roundtable participants agreed on a few key points regarding communications during the initial phase or returning to in-person work: over-communicate across as many channels as possible.

Some of the other communications tips shared by the participants to help you prepare for returning to in-person work were:

  • Create a COVID-19 specific landing page on your website for clients.
  • If you have multiple locations, create signs and PDF information packages centrally for all locations to ensure language and messaging consistency.
  • Consider hosting virtual townhalls where clients can ask your team questions and get all of the latest information and updates to feel prepared and safe for their next appointment.
  • Call every client on the phone before an appointment for pre-screening and make sure they are comfortable and informed before coming into the clinic.
  • Consider removing the option to book online altogether and make all appointments call-to-book to ensure you can screen clients before appointments and provide them with necessary information.

Pre-Screening & Consent Forms

In addition to pre-screening, many clinics are opting to have a COVID-19-specific consent form as they return to in-person work that informs clients (and in some cases staff) of the increased risks of in-person treatment during this time.

Some of the screening and consent form options that our roundtable panellists discussed were:

  • Pre-screening clients either over the phone or via email before an appointment.
  • Performing a second verbal or form screening once a client arrives in the office.
  • Having clients complete a COVID-19 consent form before every appointment.
  • Having staff complete a COVID-19 consent form at the start of every shift.

Audience Poll: Where is Your Clinic at in the Processing of Re-Opening?

🟢 13% Already open

🟡 23% Preparing to open

🔴 64% No plans in place yet

2. Returning to Work: Clinical Side

Telehealth

With the return to in-person work, the decision needs to be made whether to continue offering telehealth. There is no one size fits all answer for this. This depends on whatever works best for your clinic and clients. Each participant in the Roundtable had slightly a different answer to this question, but most agreed that with the initial return to in-person work, telehealth would continue to be offered and, in many cases, promoted as the best option for most clients.

PPE & Sanitization

One of the things that all Roundtable members agreed on was that the cleaning and sanitization were nothing new. Everyone was already sanitizing and cleaning before COVID-19. The most significant changes are the use of PPE during appointments and the continued difficulties in sourcing and ordering sanitation and cleaning supplies.

All of the Roundtable participants agreed on a few critical points for sanitization, PPE and cleaning tips for in-person appointments:

  • The standard for PPE is masks for both clients and practitioners for every appointment.
  • Clients can bring their own mask, or a single-use mask will be provided for them at no cost.
  • Gloves were considered optional for most or were used based on client and practitioner request or comfort level.
  • For most participants, full PPE is available for practitioners upon request or depending on both the client and the practitioner’s comfort level.
  • Appointments are shorter in duration, and often buffer times have been added between appointments to allow for additional time for cleaning and sanitization.
  • Staggering shift times helps to avoid clustering in the waiting room/open area and help prevent accidental gathering at pinch points.

💡 Audience members shared some additional tips and resources for sourcing sanitization supplies and PPE in the chat. You can find the chat log here.

3. Returning to Work: Jane Account Tips

NEW Feature! COVID-19 Pre-Screening Survey (Clinical Survey)

A Clinical Survey can be sent to every patient before their visit to ask them screening questions about potential COVID-19 exposure. We have provided a sample COVID-19 Pre-Screening survey that you can enable. You can customize the example, and you can also adjust when the email is delivered.

So, if you’re looking to create one of these pre-screening surveys, you’ve come to the right place! We’ve created this handy guide to walk you through each step.

Self Check-In for Patients

Jane has a neat feature that allows clients to self-check-in for their appointments through the use of a printed QR code. You may find it helpful to post the printed code on the door of your clinic so that those who do arrive ahead of schedule can check themselves in and then wait outside until the practitioner is ready to begin the session or a room is available.

For more information on managing Jane’s Self Check-in feature, you can pop over to our guides below.

Post-Treatment Time

Jane offers a couple of different ways to automatically add post-treatment time to appointments either by all appointments scheduled with a specific practitioner or by all appointments for a particular treatment. Using this feature will allow you to easily build time into your schedule to sanitize and change PPE between appointments.

Learn more about post-treatment time.

Staggered Bookings

Once you reopen your clinic, you will likely need to minimize the number of people in your clinic to make sure social distancing guidelines are being followed—one of the best ways to do this is by creating staggered bookings. Two of the most common scenarios for staggered bookings are appointments booked in two rooms and appointments booked on one shift. However, there are many different treatment styles that include overlapping or staggered appointment booking, so it’s best to test out a few scenarios and see what works best for your clinic.

Learn more about staggered bookings.

4. Roundtable Resource List for Returning to Work

Roundtable Panelists

🇺🇸 Dr. Zak Gabor, physical therapist and founder of The Level Up Initiative

Zak Gabor is a practicing Physical Therapist out of Boston PT & Wellness in Boston, Massachusetts. In this role, he works primarily with a sports orthopedic and chronic pain population. His clinical philosophy is rooted in empowering patients through relationship building, education, and exercise based strategies. Zak is also the founder of The Level Up Initiative - an online platform and community providing mentorship for new grads and students MSK providers focusing on critical thinking and communication skills.

🇨🇦 Alice Forsythe, Director of Guest Experience at Myodetox⁠

Alice joined Myodetox⁠ in 2018. She currently leads all Guest Experience operations and teams at each clinic. Before joining Myodetox, Alice worked at SoulCycle in New York City and then moved to Toronto to open the studios & market for the company. Originally from Pennsylvania, USA, Alice now calls Toronto home.

🇨🇦 Laura Patrick, physiotherapist and CEO of Kids Physio Group⁠

Laura Patrick is the founder and CEO of Kids Physio Group⁠. Prior to starting her Masters of Physiotherapy, Laura knew that she wanted to work with children, but in her first job for the public healthcare system, she quickly became aware of its intense limitations. She searched for options to refer children to for additional care in private practice but was surprised at how few adequate options were available. So she set out to fill that gap. Since then, she’s hired over 50 team employees, overseen six clinic openings and many clinic expansions, become a mother, and recently franchised the business!

🇨🇦 Carly Waring, Director of Growth & Operations at Kids Physio Group

Carly started working at Kids Physio Group⁠ in 2015 as a part-time receptionist. She quickly realized that although being a clinician wasn’t her dream, she loved the industry and saw an opportunity to apply her operational skills to help Kids Physio Group scale and open new locations across Canada. Luckily, Laura saw the potential there as well, and Carly has been finding the tangibility in her big ideas ever since. Carly is passionate about finding solutions, cultivating culture, and learning at every opportunity. She has been an integral part of Kids Physios’ growth over the past five years.

🇨🇦 Michelle Edmison, physiotherapist and owner of Movement 101

Michelle is a physiotherapist practicing in North Vancouver. She uses a combination of manual therapy, dry needling and movement to optimize rehab, performance and physical longevity. She is a movement enthusiast, certified in Kinstretch, Dynamic Neuromuscular Stimulation, Foundation Training, etc. She teaches movement classes locally and has an online school striving to provide high-quality videos globally. She is constantly learning and is insanely curious about the science of human movement. In addition, Michelle is a clinical instructor at the University of British Columbia.

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