Our goal is to provide physical therapy services to patients without health insurance and who are ineligible for insurance through the Affordable Care Act.

Thank you for your interest in becoming a part of a network of Illinois provider clinics serving this physical therapy population with valuable pro bono care.

PT Access was developed by the IPTF Pro Bono Committee. To learn more about who we are, and the history of our program development please visit here.

This website will serve as the main information site for volunteer physical therapy provider clinics. Our group has also designed a separate website that will receive referrals from health clinics that serve this uninsured population.  Our goal is to match the patient to a geographically accessible outpatient PT clinic. Patients will have demonstrated that they are without health insurance and will already have been financially vetted.

As a pro bono volunteer, you will be intentionally providing services pro bono and qualify for the Illinois Good Samaritan Act.  This will meet your professional obligation for service under the Code of Ethics.

Your clinic’s commitment to our group is to provide routine physical therapy episodes of care for as many patients as you choose to treat.  This could be one client a month, or one client per year.  The number of clients you treat is entirely at your discretion.  Our recommendation for each client is for one evaluation visit and 3 treatment visits. Referral requirements, evaluations, treatment planning, treatment provision, frequencies and durations of treatment should remain the same as for all patients coming to your clinic.

Patient encounter documentation practices remain the same as your usual practice. It is your choice whether to pay your staff for this pro bono care or require staff to volunteer their time while using clinic facilities.  There are some reporting requirements at the time of patient discharge and required participation in a yearly program evaluation.

Here is how a patient will move through the program:

Step 1:  Patient goes to a free medical clinic.  Once the medical doctor confirms that PT is needed, the clinic will vet the patient to ensure the patient has no health insurance nor has access to insurance and meets the income requirements.

Step 2:  The medical clinic staff will enter the patient’s zip code into the IPTF secure portal to find participating clinics in their vicinity. The clinic staff will then call to set up the patient’s first appointment.  An appointment card will be given to the patient with PT clinics’ address, phone number, and appointment details.  The patient will never have access to the complete list of participating PT clinics nor be allowed to make the first appointment.  This will be done by the medical clinic staff.

Step 3:  The patient will arrive at the participating PT clinic for their scheduled appointment.  The patient will complete the appropriate intake forms used by the clinic and be evaluated by a PT. The patient will be treated as a regular patient in terms of care and necessary  paperwork/medical records being completed.  Further appointments will be scheduled at the PT’s discretion.  Again, we suggest 3-4 visits, however, the number of visits is for the PT and PT clinic to decide.

Step 4: Upon discharge, the clinic will submit an outcomes form to PT Access.  We provide this form.

Thank you for considering to participate in PT Access!