Meet Beth Richardson of B Well B Social PLLC

Today we’d like to introduce you to Beth Richardson

Hi Beth, so excited to have you on the platform. So before we get into questions about your work-life, maybe you can bring our readers up to speed on your story and how you got to where you are today?
Legal assistant who thought wanted to be an attorney but realized that career didn’t fit my personality. My brother was in a terrible motor vehicle accident and I went on-line to find someone to help him recover. Having never heard of physical therapy (PT) previously that was where I was directed so looked into that as a career choice to help my brother.

I was a single 32 year-old woman at the time so an adult with adult bills (apartment, vehicle, etc.) and decided that my dislike for the legal field outweighed the financial burden of going to college to become a PT which was a 7.5 year graduate program. I knew I wouldn’t be able to help my brother personally, but he found a PT and was able to rehab back to his old self. However, he was the catalyst for my venture – and a tough venture it was.

I graduated with my doctoral degree in PT at the age of 39 with some substantial road blocks along the way the my now husband and I endured with the help of our families.

From the beginning I had the idea to create a sort of one-stop-shop for consumers to expedite their healthcare experience by creating a facility that included a Doctor of Osteopathic medicine for systemic care, a massage therapist for general soft tissue mobility, a chiropractor for general spine health and a PT for muscle balancing and rehabilitation. I quickly learned that chiropractors weren’t interested in working with a PT but rather were moving forward to oversee PT care which did not work out for them since we are on the same playing field.

My first job was in a hospital doing acute care which only lasted 11 months before I realized I wanted to be a more hands on, manual therapist. So I found a job in outpatient orthopedics near my home at the time. I learned alot there and realized that outpatient ortho was where my passion was but struggled with the insurance oversight and limitations so looked into opening my own clinic; that was in 2010.

I was directed toward a company that was privately owned and that encouraged PTs to be a partner with ownership of their clinic without significant start up costs. I accepted a position as a staff PT so I could learn the ropes and advance my continuing education to hone my skills prior to being an owner. After 3 years, I knew I needed to be my own boss for a variety of reasons, the first was I felt I could be a better manager than the one I was working under. I felt I could create a happier workplace where the staff encouraged each other, worked together and were committed to the common goal of the absolute best quality patient care.
I was fortunate enough to have fabulous folks apply and enjoy working in my clinic enough to stay with the group for many, many years. That longevity created a welcome environment for those who attended PT at our place as well as a group of colleagues that enjoyed each other and their jobs.

Unfortunately health insurance companies began putting the squeeze on what they were reimbursing us for our serivces as a profession, along with physicians. Over the past 5 years Medicare & all the commercial insurances, most notably Blue Cross & Blue Shield, cut our reimbursement to below inflation rates which equated to approximately an overall decrease in revenue of 57% in spite of our profession’s efforts to reason with them.
Those cuts created a need to increase revenue in order to maintain staff salaries (as well as raises & bonuses), purchase new medical equipment, provide continuing education to our staff for the most recent treatment interventions, etc. Well, our only source of revenue was patient care and therefore we needed to treat more patients to reach our 2019 revenue.

It became a nightmare for those of us who truly cared about our patients and their outcomes because we had to fit more in which decreased the attention & care to our patients and I couldn’t sleep at night, my staff were upset and we were all stressed out. So with a little push from 2 colleagues, Rachel Harwick & Rachael Rainko, I decided to cut my losses, sell my shares and build my own practice that I had envisioned 20 years ago in hopes of creating a space for all of us to resume our previous business model of patient centered care and employee growth & happiness.

My husband, Matt, created our name and logo and I love it. I’m in the process of opening my clinic as I type and am so excited to be able to spend time with the patients and apply my 20 years of experience to facilitate their return to function and pain-free life. As the saying goes: medicine can add years to life but PT adds life to years.

I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
Things were absolutely not smooth lol but the challenges are an opportunity for growth. The early struggles were fighting to pay my bills, feed myself and pay for my education as an adult with adult bills. We were evicted from our apartment, and had to lean on family to help us through the last 2 years of my education. I battled the insurance companies (to no avail) who are still today decreasing our reimbursement but with the help of colleagues and consumer knowledge that insurance has increased policy costs, they realize that paying out of pocket for PT is sometimes necessary.

Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know?
I am starting with B Well Integrated Physical Therapy but the company has a social aspect of it that I will grow as time allows. The social part was inspired by all of my patients over the years who struggled to use their regained function in the world mostly those who had confidence trouble and those who were elderly who had lost their spouses and many of their friends.

How do you define success?
Having a great work/life balance, not living paycheck to paycheck and enjoying what I do for a living. As Mark Twain said years ago: “Find a job you enjoy doing, and you will never have to work a day in your life.”

Contact Info:

• Website: https://bwellipt.com
• Instagram: bwell_pllc-integratedpt