Physical Therapy and Animal Rehabilitation - CALIFORNIA

As a licensed physical therapist, certified in canine rehabilitation, I am all for regulation...California needs regulation to protect the public from unscrupulous practitioners, but this NOT the answer! Please pause to look at what you are signing: 1. Under this proposed regulation, vets do not need to demonstrate competency in rehab...and rehab is a specialty niche of animal care that is not taught in the standard vet curriculum. How does this protect the consumer if they are allowed to do something they have never been taught? I believe THAT is unsafe! 2. Why are licensed physical therapists with advanced training in canine rehab (i.e. experts in the field) put under direct supervision of a vet (once again, who they themselves do not need to know ANYTHING about rehab!) when there have been no complaints of harm or neglect by a PT certified in canine rehab? MD's don't supervise PT's in the human medical model...why would vets have to? 3. What do you think will happen to costs of rehab services if now 2 high-level professionals will need to be onsite? This regulation will effectively monopolize the rehab field in the interest of the vets and costs for services will likely skyrocket and be passed on to the consumer. 4. Access to well qualified professionals will be severely limited. Consumer's right to choose who they want to treat their pet will be taken away in instances where vets choose not to hire an advanced trained physical therapist. 5. If someone feels strongly about feeling safer with having a vet on the premises, that's great...let them go to that particular practice...but don't take away everyone's right to choose their rehab practitioner for their own pet! Bottom line...True provision of consumer safety should mandate competency standards for practitioners in any specialty niche of animal care. All this regulation states is that as long as you are a vet, you can practice rehab...even if you don't know anything about rehab! C

I have been undergoing physical therapy for over 2.5 years with a fantastic RVT who is directly supervised by a veterinarian on the premises. Based on my extensive experience, I would not want to have physical therapy in an unsupervised environment for all the reasons stated in the petition. I do not think I would be safe for me and I deserve to be treated in the best environment possible. Please support the new proposed law to protect innocent animals like me.

The argument that this petition offers is bogus both medically and legally. Have you ever had physical therapy? If so, your physical therapist (PT) has NOT operated under 'direct' supervision by an M.D. -- in California, it's illegal for M.D.s to own PT practices, as the potential conflict of interest is too obvious. Instead, your M.D. refers you to a trained, licensed PT who provides you with specialized care. Your M.D. does not have this training, and would be violating state law if s/he tried to practice a specialty for which s/he has not had training. However, the CVMB is proposing letting DVMs do exactly that -- practice a speciality, animal rehabilitation (AR), for which neither they nor their RVTs have had training. This would keep the practice of AR under the financial control of veterinarians, who could practice it simply by having a DVM after their name, and who could hire any RVT to do so as well. And it would mean that the state is NOT regulating this growing field of medicine to protect consumers from unqualified or incompetent practitioners by defining and overseeing the appropriate credentials for the practice of AR. In human medicine, patients at a PT practice do not have access to emergency medical care or medication adjustment on site: if those things are needed, the patient is sent to the ER or back to the referring MD for the appropriate care. So why would a dog need those services on site? A properly qualified and licensed AR practitioner would have the training -- just as a PT does -- to know when an animal required veterinary care beyond her competency, and send the animal to the appropriate practitioner accordingly. The model works in human medicine; why wouldn't it work in animal care? Indeed, as the previous commenter notes, the proposed regs that you are being asked to support constitute 'practice protection' -- keeping AR under the financial control of veterinarians. It's worth noting that the CVMB is heavily populate

Physical therapists that have been trained in canine rehab are experts in the field and absolutely should be allowed to practice under INDIRECT supervision. I should know, I worked with one for one of my foster dogs and without her, the vet would have chopped off his leg instead! My physical therapist was instrumental in helping our struggling rescue group provide the level of care needed. We would not be able to afford this professional service if we had to pay another vet for direct unnecessary supervision. There is no "safety" issue here. This regulation you are trying to pass sounds like practice protection to me! Seems like you are only concerned about your own pocket books rather than giving people the right to choose their own rehab practitioner. Vets don't have years of dedicated training in rehab like physical therapists do! Medical doctors don't supervise PT's...why should vets? So ridiculous! You should care what the public thinks considering all the negative press you have gotten about being greedy and taking advantage of the human/animal bond.