Meet The Provider
Dr. Maha Whetsell, DPT, CMTP/DN
Dr. Whetsell is no stranger to pain! As a former classically trained ballet dancer and fitness fanatic, she has had her fair share of injuries. She understands how it feels to be on the receiving end of rehab and takes an individualized, holistic treatment approach that combines traditional PT, rehabilitative Pilates, and alternative medicine. She is a graduate of the prestigious University of Maryland, School of Medicine DPT program and has trained with highly skilled and distinguished Manual and Sports PTs.
Dr. Whetsell has treated performing artists, collegiate athletes, members of the United States Special Forces, marathoners/triathletes, and weekend warriors. Many of her patients describe her as a healer with “magic hands.”
She uses the following approaches to create an individualized treatment plan:
- Myofascial release
- Dry Needling/Certified Manual Trigger Point Therapy
- Spine and pelvic rehab
- Kinesiotaping
- Strength and stability training
- Pre and post-natal PT
- Mat and Reformer Rehabilitative Pilates
- Injury prevention education
Why choose An Out-Of-Network Provider?
One on one treatment with PT
- PT offices are usually quite busy. You see large rooms filled with endless tables and endless patients. Most PT clinics have their PT’s see multiple patients at the same time, usually only giving each patient a fraction of their hour appointment spent with the PT. That means your entire appointment isn’t just for you.
- We only see 1 patient at a time. That means when you come in for your appointment, it’s just you and the PT for the entire appointment. That increase in time spent with your PT cuts down on the number of visits you need overall because you can accomplish so much more in a single session.
Who is providing treatment PT or support staff?
- A lot of busy clinics employ support staff to assist with your physical therapy treatment. This further decreases the amount of quality time you get to spend with your physical therapist and having to switch between multiple people during a treatment session diminishes the continuity of care from your provider.
- our entire appointment is spent with your PT only and you won’t get shuffled around to another person. This means you get educated throughout your treatment, can have adjustments made on the fly as needed, and always have the most highly skilled therapy eye on you during your treatment to ensure you’re doing everything right and getting the most out of your visits.
Insurance Limitations:
- While patients can see a PT without a referral, there are still quite a few insurance plans that do require a referral or worse, an authorization, meaning you can’t start treatment until they say you can.
- Many plans also have visit limits or markers that when you meet them, they won’t cover any more visits, the fact that you may not have reached your ultimate goal (think meeting full range of motion or other measures but maybe you still have pain with running or weight lifting despite having full range of motion).
- Also, what about that insurance plan that’s supposed to cover health care costs and you just pay a copay or coinsurance payment? there’s this thing called a deductible that you have to meet and in most plans, PT is a covered service but only after the deductible has been met meaning you’re paying full price out of pocket anyway until you reach that $3000, $4000 or $5000 deductible (some are even higher than that!).
We believe that your PT and you should be the ones making decisions about your PT care, not your insurance company.
Cut down on frequency of visits
- In network PT 2-3x/wk for 6wks,
- With a cash pay model, because of the complete 1:1 time with your PT, you usually need far fewer visits. Many of our patients only need to come once a week and our average number of visits overall for a plan of care (or a course of treatment for a certain injury/pain/dysfunction) is about 5-6 visits. What sounds better, 5-6 visits or double digit visits?
Wellness, preventative and injury prevention
- Unlike the annual check-up by your physician, most insurance companies do not cover musculoskeletal wellness or injury prevention by a physical therapist. This is why you typically do not find any wellness services at large outpatient practices.
- However, those services are incredibly important. It is MUCH less expensive to prevent injuries than to treat them once they have occurred. It’s also less time missed doing your favorite things if you can prevent them as well. We would much rather work with patients on getting strong and mobile and preventing injuries instead of treating them after an injury has occurred.
More freedom to address multiple issues at the same time.
While it is extremely unfair, insurance companies strongly dictate if you get better or not based on what they will approve. Did you know that under insurance PT’s can only bill for treating one body part at a time? That means that you would need 2 separate evals and visits each week to be able to bill your insurance for your knee and your shoulder problem. In some cases, your PT may be able to justify it.
Many insurance companies reimburse for out-of-network PT.
Depending on your out-of-network benefits, your insurance company may actually reimburse you for your visits! Just make sure you get a superbill from your PT that you can submit to your insurance company.
Your health is worth any amount and is the BEST investment you could ever make.
It is simple, you only get one body and one chance– take care of it!!All of this really comes back to one main point. Cash based Physical Therapy has the ability to provide you with the highest quality of care.
