It was just a year and a half ago that my wife and I first discussed the idea of expanding Nantahala Physical Therapy by building our own physical therapy clinic in Franklin. We had (and continue to have) a great relationship with our then-landlords inside the Franklin Health and Fitness Center, and especially loved the results our patients got through aquatic therapy using their indoor pool. We knew that it was important that Nantahala Physical Therapy continue offering aquatic therapy to our patients and, if we were going to build a brand new facility, we must include a pool somehow.
After a lot of research (including a super cool trip to the Clemson athletic rehab facility, located inside their football stadium), we selected a Swim Ex pool.
For patients who were treated with aquatic therapy while we were at the Fitness Center, there are definitely differences to your experience there versus in our new clinic.
- This pool is much smaller, only fitting 2-3 patients comfortably. You aren’t dodging water aerobics participants or lap swimmers now! However, this is one case where size doesn’t matter. The SwimEx pool is a resistance pool, meaning we can control the amount of current to make the therapy more or less rigorous. This current essentially replaces the need for pool length. If your goal is to swim laps again, you can still do that in this pool.
- Second, our SwimEx pool is warmer. We keep our pool set around 92 degrees, which is about 4 degrees higher than the Fitness Center’s pool. This temperature is more comfortable for patients, as it is cool enough to perform exercises but warm enough to quickly adjust to the water and warm up your muscles.
- Only therapy is occurring at this clinic. There will be rare times you may share the pool with another patient but usually there is only one person in the pool at a time (with his/her therapist), meaning more privacy and customization for that patient’s particular goals.
If you’ve considered aquatic therapy before but have been wary of attempting it at our previous location, I encourage you to come take a look and talk to any of the therapists about what we can do to help reach your goals.
Randy