Telehealth delivery of Physical Therapy to Occupational Workers with Low Back Pain (LBP) is a practice change project that uses information technology to diagnose, treat and monitor the occupational worker with LBP, while in a different physical location than the expert providing the care. Telehealth technology is the use of communications technology to transmit medical information from one location to another and has evolved to remove geography as a barrier to care, thus allowing patients to receive care when and where they need it. Telehealth is seen as a venue for improving healthcare access in vulnerable populations, rural areas and in specialty areas. LBP is a significant health care problem in the industrialized world with a major economic impact in the United States, with total costs related to this condition exceeding $100 billion per year. Additional costs are accrued in terms of medical treatment, lost productivity and nonmonetary costs such as diminshed ability to perform usual activities, which then decreases quality of life. Therefore, due to the significant health care problem and the expensive nature of LBP, innovative and effective management needs to be obtained to prevent progression to chronic LBP which is even more complex and costly. The objectives are to utilize Telehealth technology for physical therapy to make this specialty more accessible to occupational workers with LBP. The tools used to evaluate this technique of delivery, are a Telehealth survey, adapted from the Utah Telehealth Network, and the Oswestry Low Back Pain Scale that is used globally by physical therapists to determine the percentage of disability inflicted by the LBP. The purpose of this project is to launch a practice change project to test the utilization of Telehealth technology in an on-site clinic at a Textile Mill for a prompt evaluation, assessment, and treatment of occupational workers with LBP. This will be accomplished by a Doctor of Physical Therapy that specializes in the Mechanical, Diagnosis and Treatment of the spine certified by the McKenzie Institute. This is commonly known as the McKenzie Method which will be the term used for this project and paper. This project seeks to answer the questions: can physical therapy delivered via Telehealth technology provide appropriate delivery of physical therapy to occupational workers with LBP and can occupational workers have improved LBP management with the use of the McKenzie Method physical therapy that is delivered via Telehealth technology? The theoretical foundation used for this project is an Evidence Based Practice (EBP) Change Model and will be used as the framework to guide the project and discussed in detail later in this paper. The framework used for LBP and physical therapy is The Physical Therapy Model to guide LBP treatment which attempts to organize a comprehensive physical therapy strategy for optimal LBP management. The findings of the Telehealth delivery of Physical Therapy to Occupational Workers with LBP suggested that Telehealth delivery of physcial therapy was an appropriate technique to access this specialty and that the McKenzie Method was successful in decreasing LBP while increasing self-treatment and management of the LBP and recommended it’s use for a more timely access to physical therapy.
