How to Design the Perfect Layout (floor plan) for a Physical Therapy, Chiropractic, Massage Clinic

Okay, cool. Let's talk about floor plans. Who's excited about floor plans? Maybe type a yes in the chat. You know, we talked a lot of, like, boring stuff, but I think it was necessary, especially if you're planning to, like, open up a clinic. Maybe type yes in the chat. Okay. Everyone's like, oh, my God, I'm glad we're finally done all this legal stuff. All right, so let's do a poll. I want to find out, like, how much square footage are you getting for your next clinic? Right. So let's not just pull. I won't get the type of size are you getting? Is it less than 1000 square feet? Is it a thousand to 1500? Is it 2000, 3000? What do you think the number is, Paul?

I think it's going to be 15 to 2000. 1500 to 2000.

Okay, what are you.

Darrell, two to three.

Two to three. Okay, let's share the results. What is it?

Oh, 1000 to 1500.

See, I told you this, like, earlier this week, Paul. I thought, like, most people start up, their clinic is usually around, like, 1,000 to 1,500 square feet.

Right, Right. Yeah.

So. And once you start moving up, like, you'll realize, oh, my God, I don't have enough space. I actually need about 2,500 square feet. Right. You know, which is kind of. So, Paul, like, you've gone through so many clinics. What would you say is the optimum size if you don't want to, like, move your space again in the future?

Yeah, that's a great question. So let's assume that you have a good marketing plan in. You have a good location, you know that you're going to get assessments. Right. Or that you have a really good chance of getting assessments. I'd say the optimal size is about 22 to 2500 square feet. 22. 200 to 2500 square feet. It's not super huge, but it's also enough where you can actually do. You can grow significantly in that space. And I'm talking about anywhere between one and a half to $3 million worth of revenue, right?

Totally. At 2200 square feet, you could hit 2,3 million easily, right?

That's right.

You hit 2 million easily.

Yeah, yeah. But with. With a thousand to 1,500 square feet. And you know, again, everybody has to start somewhere. So you get. You guys are all going to go through this journey and don't change your plans just because we're saying this, but like, 1,000 to 1,500, you're going to find you're very limited by space very quickly, you know, if you're getting enough new assessments. Right.

What about you, Darrell?

Yeah, no, I'm the same about 2000 to 2500. What I find is if I'm below the 1800, you really have to be, you know, crafty and savvy with your treat, with your actual floor plan. And it takes a lot of time and lots of renditions. I think the piece of it to share though is what's come up quite a bit in some of our community conversations is that, you know, it's like, well, how many beds do I need? And I have all these therapists that I want to work at the same time because they're getting all these assessments and now you actually have a problem because you can't actually get enough patients on beds. So it's just something to certainly think about. But my sweet spot, certainly I would totally agree with Paul.

Yeah. And also like, you know, also building your space, maybe you don't build it, maybe you build it to a certain, certain layout, but make sure your layout is flexible enough that you could expand into non essential space. So for example, gyms, I mean, gyms I think are essential, but if you really had to create more bed space, then you could expand into the gym or boardroom space or staff rooms. Like those are all areas that you could potentially expand treatment beds into, right?

Yeah. I think the only other thing too, if I have chosen less than 2,000 square feet, it's because there's a lot of common area that I get to utilize. So if all my washrooms, for example, are in a medical space or development, I'm actually okay because it's all about my usable space.

That's a great point. Yeah.

And then once again, guys like, you know, it depends on how you run your operations. Right. You know, and this is something we do in our community all the times. We get everyone to go on shifts versus non shifts.

Right.

Paul, can you maybe share with like our attendees, like what we mean by that and how it could have impact on your business?

Yeah, for sure. So I think the majority of clinic owners, the majority of clinic owners have a shift that looks like the non shift side where it's like 9am to 3pm maybe, maybe like they go into the evenings, 5 to 6pm that sort of thing. And that shift is really designed for the clinician. Right. The clinician wants to work 9 to 5. But if you're really, you know, wanting to provide a business that is patient centered, that is really about the patient experience and the patient journey. Then the shifts actually become really important because most people work, like most people, we're open on Sundays. Like who opens on Sundays. Right. This is the direction that healthcare is going. It's about patient experience, it's about availability, it's about making sure that your schedule caters to your patients and not necessarily your clinicians. Right.

Yeah. I think in the past we would have said we had failed attempts at doing weekends. And right now my clinical practice, because of my schedule is, is on a Saturday and it's full.

Yep, I know. Clinics opening on Sundays now, too. Like used to, used to be Saturdays, now it's Sundays. Right. And you're gonna find light, you're gonna, you're gonna find your, your, your senior therapist won't do these jobs, but like the new people will. Right? Just depends on the messaging that you put together.

Right.

And we talked about this earlier, like part timers and a full timers ball. Right?

Yeah, Part timers. I call part timers clinic killers. Right. And it's nothing about their personality or nothing about how they treat. Right. It's purely because I know that if I want my patients to get better, I know I'm going to front end load those treatments. I want those patients to not come forever, not come for the rest of their lives. But, you know, for the first couple weeks at least, I want them to come three to two to three times a week. But if I have someone working just Tuesday, Thursday, and they're at another clinic on the rest of the week, the chances of those two days, of the clinician's days matching up with the patient's two days that they need to come in, the chances of those two days matching up are very slim. Like, it's very unlikely. Right. Some of you might have people who are working three days in the morning and three days in the evening. That's essentially the same thing as having two part time people. One person working in the evening, one person working in the morning. The same effect is going to happen. So, you know, again, for me it's about consistency, patient experience, having the availability of that physio, that chiro, that massage therapist available for that patient. And you can only achieve that with full time people.

Cool.

Cool.

Yeah, absolutely. So let's go through these floor plans, right? You know, like, you know, I like the schematic here because I like rectangles, right. And I hate skinny rectangles and I hate like odd shape, like shapes. And I, I'm not a big fan of squares, Darrell. What's your thoughts about this when it comes to a floor plan?

Yeah, I've designed all of those spaces in the past and rectangle. 100% as much as I possibly can.

But a fat rectangle. Not a.

Not a. Yeah, yeah, no, no. Like, actually you can't see my screen, but I'm circling with my finger the one on the left.

Left.

Okay, cool, cool. Paul, anything else you want to add to this?

Oh, 100%. 100%. Yeah. You don't want. And you don't want a rectangle that's too fat either. It has to be sort of the. Just right, like, you know, the thing right in the middle that's the most effective for sure.

Okay, so I think we have about 10 floor plans here. So I thought let's roll it. Let's kind of go through it and we'll maybe we'll do some feedback on what we think about each of them. That sounds cool. Let's do the first one. Can everyone see this on their screen? Maybe Type yes in the question box if you can see this clearly. Cool, cool. All right, so this is one of those odd shape ones, right? Let me pull out my pen. Here's my little pen. I think this is the entrance here, Right. And this is the. This is the. Can you see my mouse here or no?

Yep.

Okay, cool. Yeah. So waiting area, I think. I think this is the waiting area. Front desk, waiting area. There's a room back here, right? Room, room, room, room, room. Odd shape. You know, what are your thoughts about that, Darryl?

Um, so my thoughts are it's a small space. So when I have those small spaces, I would be looking at creating, you know, less private rooms. In that situation, I would be building in more sort of open curtain areas that would bleed into the gym. So because it's a really small gym space in there. So I would probably leave those, you know, those private rooms in the back corner there. But I would turn that in because you can actually gain more beds as well. You know, usually for two private beds, I can get three beds in a curtained area, which is still private.

And this leads to interesting conversation. There's a constant debate within the industry is, like, about, you know, private rooms versus curtains. Right. You know, like what? And it's bad for patient experience. What are your thoughts about that, Darrell?

Yeah, so I'm certainly a guy that.

If I want my patients to get better, I know I'm going to front end load those treatments. I want those patients to not come forever, not come for the rest of their Lives. But for the first couple weeks at least, I want them to come two to three times a week. But if I have someone working just Tuesday, Thursday, and they're at another clinic on the rest of the week, the chances of those two days, of the clinician's days matching up with the patient's two days that they need to come in, the chances of those two days matching up are very slim. Like it's very unlikely, right? Some of you might have people who are working three days in the morning and three days in the evening. That's essentially the same thing as having two part time people. One person working in the evening, one person working in the morning. The same effect is going to happen. So, you know, again, for me it's about consistency, patient experience, having the availability of that physio, that chiro, that massage therapist available for that patient. And you can only achieve that with full time people.

Cool.

Cool.

Yeah, absolutely. So let's go through these floor plans, right? You know, you know, like, you know, I like this schematic here because I like rectangles, right? And I hate skinny rectangles and I hate like odd shape, like shapes. And I'm not a big fan of squares. Darrell, what's your thoughts about this when it comes to a floor plan?

Yeah, I've designed all of those spaces in the past and rectangle 100% as much as I possibly can.

But a fat rectangle, not a. Yeah.

Yeah, no, like actually you can't see my screen, but I'm circling with my finger the one on the left.

Okay, cool, cool. Paul, anything else you want to add to this?

Oh, 100%. 100%, yeah. You don't want, and you don't want a rectangle that's too fat either. It has to be sort of the, just right, like, you know, the thing right in the middle that's the most effective for sure.

Okay, so I think we have about 10 floor plans here. So I thought let's roll it, let's kind of go through it and we'll maybe we'll do some like kind of like feedback on what we think about each of them. Is that sounds cool. All right, let's do the first one. Can everyone see this on their screen? Maybe type yes in the, in the question box if you can see this clearly. Okay, cool, cool. All right, so this is one of those odd shaped ones, right? So let me pull out my pen. Okay, here's my little pen. I think this is the entrance here, right? And this is the. Can you see my mouse here? Or no.

Yep.

Okay, cool. Yeah. So waiting area, I think. I think this is the waiting area. Front desk, waiting area. There's a room back here, right? Room, room, room, room, room. Odd shape, you know. What are your thoughts about that, Darrell?

So my thoughts are it's a small space. So when I have those small spaces, I would be looking at creating, you know, less private rooms. In that situation, I would be building in more sort of open curtain areas that would bleed into the gym. So because it's a really small gym space in there. So I would probably leave those, you know, those private rooms in the back corner there. But I would turn that in because you can actually gain more beds as well. You know, usually for two private beds, I can get three beds in a curtained area, which is still private.

And this leads to interesting conversation. There's a constant debate within the industry is like, about, you know, private rooms versus curtains. Right. You know, like what? And it's bad for patient experience. What are your thoughts about that, Darrel?

Yeah, so I'm certainly a guy with a bias, right. So majority of my practices have always been in an open mind concept area. It may be in my training, but, you know, I always have my private rooms when it comes to, you know, my initial consults and whatnot. But me, the type of patient population I see and the fact that I supervise a lot of physios. And we know that, you know, mentorship and support is the number one thing that a lot of our younger grads are looking for. And it's very difficult to mentor in a private room. So having that open visibility, it's great for mentorship, it's great for, for patients interaction because we know there's a social benefit, but it's also really good for culture as well.

What about you, Paul?

Yeah, I'm the same way. I think Darrell and I grew up in the same environment. Right. So I prefer open curtain rooms as well. And it's not just visibility, it's also auditory. Right. Like you can actually hear what's going on. And especially when you do a lot of mentoring and bring a lot of new people on, they you want to be able to hear the types of conversations, the type of scripting that they're using so you can actually give feedback on that. The other thing too, that I find with closed rooms, and you guys will, whoever's on the call here, you'll notice this, is that the amount of time, and I know this seems silly, but the amount of time it takes to go in from one closed room to Another closed room. Those are like three or four extra steps per patient, per treatment. Right. When you start compounding that over a year. Right. That adds up to a lot of steps, and that adds up to a lot of time that you're actually traveling. Right. And so with open current rooms, when, especially when they're all in a row, you know, you can travel very quickly through many different rooms.

So, Paul, that's great from a staff experience, but what from a patient experience? Like, if I'm a patient, don't I want to be, like, in a private room?

You know, I think there's a time and a place for sure. But I've seen. And I think that all boils down to a culture thing. Right. You know, in our clinic, where we have, you know, some people are definitely gonna want a private rooms and that's okay. And, you know, maybe your culture is all about having that sort of spa, like, you know, treatment, and that's okay too. There's nothing wrong with that. But I've seen open curtain rooms work really well because. Because of the culture in the clinic where the physiotherapists love working with each other, they really bounce a lot of ideas off each other. The patients actually get a sense of how good that culture is. And it actually, I find, makes the patients want to come back more. Right. Because they're like, oh, it's so fun there. I love the environment. I love how everybody talks to each other. And that's sort of what I enjoyed when I was working as a physio. Right. Yeah. I think the patients see that too. Yeah. Sorry. Yeah.

The piece that I would add too, is especially, you know, for me, I've worked in an assistant based model, or again, I work more in like a fellowship model with students and therapists. So, you know, that open concept is. It helps that model of care, if that's something that you're looking to do, obviously operationalize or move towards. But I would say, you know, my practice is very big on, you know, I do a lot of co management with a pelvic health pt, so those patients are obviously in a private room for pelvic health, and they're coming back into my typical orthopedic practice. And there's never a discussion about why is it that I'm with you in a closed room? And then why does Darrell always have us in an open concept space? That has never been. Because I've never allowed it to be in the culture that I have within the clinics.

Yeah. And don't get me wrong, I Think. I think you have to have a mix. Like, I actually think you need closed rooms and you open. Well, for me, anyways, I like open rooms, so. Yeah.

Okay, cool. Paul, what about the space? Like, this is one of those, like, awkward shapes that we don't like, right? Yeah.

To be honest, I think they maximized the hell out of that space. I think they did a really good job. Right. But the awkward space is. To me, it is really tough. And again, you can kind of see here, like, the thousand square feet is a real limiting factor. Like, let's say this person starts to really grow and they start to expand. You're really limited by two to maybe one and a half to two shifts a day. Right. Or maybe three shifts if you're. If you're really aggressive. Right. And so, you know, there's three beds.

So in theory, they could run for. They could run for like four shifts a day.

Yeah, right. That's right.

That's right.

You could, but it would be really busy, and I think you get a lot of people running into each other because the space limitations are there. Right. I do think they maximized it really well, though, so. But. But the awkward space, I think is an issue. Right.

Okay, let's fly through the next one. What's the next. Oh, geez, what's this one? All right, let's fly through the next one. What's the next one? What about this space? 1500 square feet. Let's see, the. This is a door coming in. This is the reception area. They got the gym space here, and then they got two rooms here, four closed rooms here, and then a staff room in the back. Yeah.

So for me, I actually like having the staff room close to the front desk. And the reason I like that is because sometimes the front desk will have to pull, you know, a clinician in to talk about, well, what do you want for this treatment plan? Or what do you want, you know, what's going on with this billing? Or is this person coming back in? And if the front desk has to leave the front desk to go to the staff room, then it creates a little bit of a gap in patient experience if they have people waiting at the front. Right.

What about you, Darrell?

Yeah, there's a couple things here is. And for me, I agree with Paul with being close to the front, but I would also would have shifted it onto the windows side just because if you look at all those windows that are in those treatment spaces, despite that, it's actually quite good for marketing. It's going to get hot in Those rooms, you're gonna have to think about that.

Yeah.

These are the windows on the wall. Yeah, yeah.

And not a bad thing. But again, that's where I really like the open concept because it helps so much with lighting and your efficiencies there. But the other piece too, for me is I'm a little bit concerned about that waiting area. Cause it's quite large and that's kind of your gym space. And depending on the patient population, you see, you know, some of my patient population wouldn't want to be on display with people in the waiting room. So that would just be a couple thoughts. They're moving.

Do you like your gym space in the front or in the back of the house?

Are you asking me?

Yes.

Oh, sir, I actually make sure my gym's actually somewhat in the central area where I'm moving around the gym, because I always want oversight on the gym.

Well, this is. This is a great. Remember how we had that skinny rectangle at the beginning? Right. This is an example of one of those skinny rectangles where the owner of this place had to shift the beds lengthwise or horizontally. Right. And so again, when you talk about the number of steps that you have to take now, you've actually increased those number of steps to get to every single patient. Right. And so I find that, you know, if you. If you just had a little wider space, then you could have put the. The beds vertically. Right.

I knew. I do think again, they maximize the space as well as they did.

They did, yeah, absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah.

Cool. Let's do the next one.

I like the coffee and drinks too. I like that part. That little bar.

Yeah.

All right, what about this one? 1600 square feet. So this is the. This is the entrance. You come in, reception area.

Right.

And then they got three closed rooms, staff room, bathroom, and then, you know, gym slash physio curtain area.

I actually, I think they maximize the space. Well, right. The only thing I would do is I'd probably switch. Maybe I wouldn't, but maybe I'd switch the staff room and the bathroom so that, you know, the bathroom is like more central and easy to access. And the staff room is again, closer to the reception. What I really like about this one is that I like a galley style treatment area. So, you know, Rick, I don't know if you could take your pointer, but you see the open rooms at the top there of that square? Right. So those. What I like is the ability to put the. So that bottom part of that big square would likely be a gym. But let's say this clinic gets super busy. I could actually put more beds at the bottom of that square. Right. And, you know, create more bed space.

So.

So it gives me a lot of options to expand out. And the galley style is good because you could put a central prep area in the middle, and then you have really quick access to all the. From either side, from top and bottom. Right?

Yeah. I think just the piece there about just moving around the washrooms, I can see why they did it the way they did, because obviously all your plumbing is actually set well there, so it would be more efficient. But you. But I agree with Paul, like, if you do just make a couple shifts and you just move things around, if this isn't developed yet, that would be one piece. The only thing I would do is I'd be quite strategic. If this is a multidisciplinary site for me, I know there's a little bit of a gap in those three rooms there, but I would want my. For me, as a PT assessor, I would want to be as close to the treatment space as possible for my consult. But then you got to be mindful of where's your rmt, for example, where, you know, that needs to be a little bit quieter in a privateer space, you know, if it is going to be up to the top front, you may need to insulate that room a little bit more. So it's just a few things that way, just on that structure, because of how that door opens. Slam. So then you just want to be mindful of how you set up those private rooms because of where your traffic is. But I do like the setup.

Darrell brings up an amazing point. Right. The rmt. So I'm just going to repeat it. The RMT space, you really should make sure it's insulated well. Right. Make sure that from a sound perspective. Because a lot of these sort of commercial buildings, they don't put any soundproofing between the walls. It's really bad patient experience. When they're getting, you know, this. This massage treatment, then they hear, like, crash. Something fell on the floor outside. Or you could hear people talking, like, you know, insulate your massage rooms. For sure.

Yeah. One time I put the pillies on the massage wall, and that was a bad idea.

Yeah. I'm curious, like, maybe in the question box, maybe give a score out of 10. What do you guys think about this floor plan here? Out of 10? 10. You love it? 0. You don't like it? Tammy, you're about to say something.

Yeah, I just have a question. I Get a question from a lot of clinicians when I'm helping them set up a clinic, and they're always wondering how big the treatment rooms should be, how much space should they leave around the treatment table so that they can work well and work freely. And I see 6 by 8 there in that floor plan. Is that. Is that pretty standard for you guys?

I think that's maximizing the space for sure. Six by eight is tight. Right. But even if you went six and a half by eight and a half, or even seven to nine, that works as well. Right? Six by eight is when you're really trying to fit a lot of beds in. For sure.

Yeah, yeah, I'll go seven or eight, you know, so I think it's. Yeah, I think it's a little tight. So.

Yeah, and I think obviously that's the curtain area, so that, you know, that movement in the curtain certainly gives you that flexibility. But as far as a private room goes, depending on the space, you know, depending on how wide the triangle is, if you will, it's either, you know, 10 by 10 or 8 by 11, those sorts of things, because you obviously need more space because you don't have any bend in the wall as you do with the curtains.

Larry Car uses six by nine. You know, John is like seven by seven by nine.

Right.

So, yeah.

Cool.

One thing we want to add is, like, you know, one of the things I like is like, if your main business is like physio and then in here, like you have like a Cairo massage and maybe like Cairo massage, other services. It's nice that when the patient comes in, they can actually see what services are being provided before they go into the cohort business. Right. So it does a bit of. It's kind of that IKEA journey that you talk about all the time, Paul?

Yeah, like, if you go to Ikea, you'll notice that there's. You can't actually get to another section easily. You have to flow through the entire business. And they actually have signage with arrows pointing to what section you're going to go to next. And it's designed purposely that way, where you actually get to see every section of the business of what types of products that they sell. And so for us, we like to design our clinics where you have to flow through. You have to see every single component of the business until you get to your treatment area. And the treatment area, you can see in the back, that's the largest area. That's where the bulk of our business is done. So everybody always flows through that way. Right.

Okay, let's look at some bigger floor plans now. Geez, we're running out of time here. Let's look at, let's look at maybe. Let's look at this one. This is 2,500 square feet. This is more square shaped.

Right.

And so this is the entrance here. Like you walk in, this is the waiting area, reception here. When you come out, you got the exercise area here. You got, you know, like a private room. You got curtain. Curtain. Curtain curtains here. So 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 curtain rooms. And then you got, in essence, three offices. They got a mezzanine, but let's just forget that. And, and, and they got a change room here and then have a little like, I think this is like their sink or workstation here. Right. So.

Yeah, if, you know. Yeah, yeah, I think, I think the waiting area, the reception area is just slightly big, but you know, you're kind of working within a square here. What I really like is that central prep area that you just pointed out. Right. And again, why is that important? Well, you can see that the access point to all the treatment rooms, whether it's closed offices or whether it's curtain rooms, it's all sort of equidistant distant to that central prepping area. One thing that you want to keep in mind is that central prepping area should, should have electricity built into the base and lots of outlets because. And it has to be big enough. I think that central prepping area is a little bit small because you're going to want people to chart there, you're going to want people to set up their hot packs there. You might even want plumbing to that area if you're really going to get fancy. I don't like plumbing because, you know, because it really sort of fixes that spot. And if you want to do renos later, you're going to have a hard time moving that central area. But that to me is one of the best design points of this space. And again, a square space is tough. Like I, you know, I think they've done the best possible job here for sure. Yeah.

Darrell, before I get started, maybe in the chat in the question box, I want to. Can people maybe like throw in the question box, give a score out of 10 on this plan? Did it, is it 10? Is it 9, 8, 7? Like throw in the chat? I want to see what you guys say. Darrell, go ahead.

Yeah, I just want to comment on the island too. So for me, I've used this in every clinic I've designed since the first One I've done. And it helps keep the entire clinic clean, too. Right. So if that island or that central kind of charting area, if you will, you can put all your towels in there. Like, it really just keeps everything clean. I put all of our equipments in there, so patients are always coming to that. And again, when you think about having multiple shifts and multiple PTs and CAIROs and RMTs working in there, it becomes your central station for equipment and resources. The only thing, though, that I would say that I kind of am on the same page as Paul is I try to not make that as a fixed area, just because for me, you know, when you want to take advantage of a square space, even though it's a bit more complicated, I like that because this allows me to move that island and I can move those PT beds and I can bring in yoga classes and Pilates classes and things like that after hours to really take advantage of my downtime in the clinic, for example. So I really like that. But I make sure you're always giving yourself enough space to think about what future growth could be from a service delivery perspective.

Yeah. Cool.

All right, let's move to the next one. This square plan is 2,400 square feet. Here's an odd shape reception area. But like, you know, the reception is here. And then once they come in, they got, you know, in essence, all the closed rooms here. And then they got all the. I believe these are curtains with a galley, right?

Yeah. So this is my favorite layout because I created it.

I was going to say this looks like yours.

Well, this is, I think, because we created this like a couple years ago. So it is actually some of the culmination of a lot of the things that we learned over the last 15, 20 years. Couple of things that I would. Again, it's kind of like that IKEA thing. You have to pass by all these, like the Cairo or massage, all these other different services to get to the current area. A couple of things I would change. I would never do circular walls again. Circular walls are just really difficult to maximize space. You do waste a lot of space. You can't put a desk right up against it unless you have a very special curved desk. You know, I would actually definitely make the laundry and the staff room smaller. You don't need a huge laundry. And you could even combine those two. And then I would get another office space in there. And then the MD flex area. We were going to have a physician come in. That didn't work out. But creating a storage area or, you know, a Filing area for your front desk, I think is something that is important for clinics, for sure.

Yeah. I don't have much to comment on this, Paul, and just the circular walls look like they were probably a pain. But the only thing that I think is important to note in Paul's here is that in a lot of the previous floor plans, we didn't really see was there laundry in those floor plans that wasn't really identified yet. And that's a huge, huge benefit, especially if you have a multidisciplinary site or, sorry, clinic. And the other piece, too, though, is always storage. So one of our biggest challenges has always been, you know, you try to maximize the space, but if you've got product sales and all those sorts of things going in, and if you just think of your daily equipment needs and resources that way, you know, don't. Don't forget about the amount of storage that we would need. So either you're maximizing your wall space or, you know, you still need room for a vacuum or a, you know, broom, things like that. So just. I just would say that Paul's highlighted those here, and I just wanted to mention those to the group.

What's. What's a good square footage for. What's a good size for our private rooms? We have one of the questions in the chat.

Yeah, I think nine. Nine by ten. That's ideal, right?

Yeah, for me. Yeah, for me, I go 10 by 10. Or if it's a longer. Like in this case where Paul is, I may have a little bit more of a narrow room. So it might be 11 by 8 or something like that.

Hey, let's give a score out of 10. Like, what do you guys think about this floor plan? It's a lot easier when you have 2400 square feet to design something versus something. 1500. I'm just telling you guys, like, it's hard to Design something with 1500 square feet. Wow, there's some nines here, Paul. Not bad. Not bad. I don't know if they like you or why they're giving you a score, but, like.

If you had to expand that, would you. Where would you put your next treatment room? Where would you add the office? Would you break down the flex room or would you take down the staff room?

I would take down the staff room and move the staff room to the flex area. To the flex room?

Yeah.

Again, you want your staff room close to your front desk, right? Yeah.

All right, let's look at the next floor plan, guys. This is a bit of an odd shape. One to be honest. 2200 square feet. The entrance is right here. So you come in, right. And reception is here, Admin is right here. And then you got one, two, three private rooms with storage here. And then what is a bathroom back here? Another exam room here, another exam room here. And then it looks like there's a little partition wall with like a big gym space here, a working island. Is that what that is, Darrell? Right, yeah. And then four Truman beds. Do you want to maybe just talk us through this?

Yeah, sure. So this space was actually designed, it's one of our newer clinics and. And what it is, is on this left hand side here, it was actually designed where we have all of our additional services. So that's where RMT and Chiro will be. But we actually have a physician practice in there as well. So it's sort of off to the left hand side and as you walk through the clinic. So, you know, we actually needed a little bit more of a shared reception space. So that's why it's right when you come in. And it kind of has this U shape, so that way patients can go to the left and they obviously come into the physio space. But we set it up in a way where physio is rate and visibility for non physio patients coming through the door. They're aware of what services that we're offering. The main assessment area is this one down straight ahead. So this way you have visibility over the entire gym space. And it actually this physio that works here primarily as the lead clinician runs an assistant model too, and she's actually quite focused on a lot of exercise equipment. So it's actually really nice sort of gym space at the same time with lots of room to grow and add more beds as needed. So that's why it looks a little bit open there. So this space certainly has lots of opportunity to expand that multidisciplinary clinic.

And Paul, what's your feedback on this?

Yeah, you know what? I didn't know this was yours, Darrell, and that's the honest truth. So when I was looking at it, I was like, why is this set up this way? And when you say that you have a medical side and a physio side, then it makes perfect sen because I felt like the distance between the open rooms and the closed rooms was like far right. And so. But it makes sense that you have the medical on that one side and you do really want to separate those services. Right.

I think you're bringing up a good point. This is important, like a Lot of the, like, really like, a lot of like, we're giving like fly by like guidance right now, but we also don't understand your business model.

Right.

So you guys have to take like, we're just assuming you have a typical multi disparate clinic. If you have specialized services that require certain things like we're not kind of factored in. So those are things you have to kind of like consider. We're just giving you like general like feedback of typical clinics.

Right, so that's right. That's right. So now. Yeah, so. And as I was saying that now it makes a lot more sense. You know, again, if I, if this was just a regular sort of rehab clinic with all the multidisciplines in it, I would try to shift it so that there was more just a one way walkthrough and then they'd have to walk right back through, through to get to exit as well. But that's right, this makes sense.

Okay.

Cool.

I do like you having like open gym area with like nice like windows there.

Right.

So yeah, it's actually a beautiful space for sure.

Yeah.

But I do, I don't like these like weird shapes like this. It's not ideal.

Right?

Yeah.

But sometimes like you're in as if you're in a. Sometimes you don't have a lot of like options, so you don't have a choice. Right.

So yeah, like to go back and kind of summarize the points earlier, like why we chose that space. In the end, there's 22,000 new condo developments happening in the next 10 years in this area. So it was certainly one of those things where not the perfect space, but certainly needed room to grow, which is quite exciting about the population.

And were you the only clinic there?

No, there's two.

Okay, so then you have a ratio of like 10,000 to 1 then, right?

Mm.

Is it 10,000? Yeah, 10,000 people per clinic, right? Yeah. Which makes it attractive to do. Cool. All right. All right. Oh, let's give a score out of 10. Like what do you guys think about this floor plan? Out of 10? 10 if you love it, one you don't.

I would just say as we developed this one, we learned a lot about new codes that are in place. So certainly in Ontario there's a lot of expensive stuff that goes into this. So hopefully if you're in other provinces, it's still cheaper.

Okay, so here's, here's the last floor plan. We'll look at this floor, give a score out of 10.

Like.

What do you guys Think about this floor plan. Out of 10, 10 if you love it, one you don't.

I would just say as we developed this one, we learned a lot about new codes that are in place. So certainly in Ontario there's a lot of expensive stuff that goes into this. So hopefully if you're in other provinces, it's still cheaper.

Okay, so here's, here's the last floor plan we'll look at. This floor plan is quite interesting. You walk in, it's a reception area. They also have a separate waiting area. Right. So these are where like, you know, because usually when you check in is really busy for an existing patient. Like this is where they hang out. You know, like it's almost like a lounge chair. And then along the way it has some of the stuff that Paul's talking about where you have, you know, the 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 closed rooms. You know, you got the staff room. The bathroom plan is quite interesting. You walk in is a reception area. They also have a separate room. You got an open physio gym area, right? Yeah. Paul, what do you think, what do you think about the waiting area and what do you think about this floor plan?

So I really like the waiting area. I think it allows patients to just sort of, if they're rushing in, signing into to the reception allows them to decompress a little bit and waiting area.

Right. So these are where like, you know, because usually when you check in, it's really busy for an existing patient. Like this is where they hang out. You know, like it's almost like a lounge chair. And then along the way it has some of the stuff that Paul's talking about where you have, you know, the 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 closed rooms. You know, you got the staff room.

The bathroom, you know, have a coffee or whatnot. And, and especially if the physio is running behind or the chiro or whoever's running behind, it provides a little bit more comfort. So again, it's about patient experience. Right. I also think that if you do need to expand, it allows you to expand as well. So, you know, if we're really limited by space and we start growing significantly, that waiting area becomes optional space where you could turn it into maybe two closed offices or maybe you could, you know, move the staff room to the waiting area and then add, let's say, two more treatment beds. But again, this 2,400 square foot facility gives you a lot of options to expand. Again, as we talked about earlier, you could actually duplicate like you have five treatment, open treatment rooms. There in the gym area, you could actually.

You got an open physio gym area, right? Yeah. Paul, what do you think, what do you think about the waiting area and what do you think about this floor plan?

So I, I really like the waiting area. Um, I think it allows patients to just sort of put another five at the bottom and then have a galley style and get rid of your gym. So again, it's just options to expand. Maybe you. Maybe part of your philosophy is that you always have a gym and that's okay too. There's nothing wrong with that. Um, but then that's when you would look at another space. If you don't want to open up another space. Putting new curtain rooms at the bottom there. Makes sense, right?

Yeah. I'm a big fan of like maybe going like all in on making your reception.

If they're rushing in, signing into to the reception allows them to decompress a little bit.

And actually including a waiting area, making it bigger than what most clinics do so that you actually have a bit of that retail feel.

Right.

And so, and. But your sacrifice seems like it may be extra room, but I think, you know, if you're running shifts and you're doing some of the stuff we talked about earlier, you're gonna have more than enough space to actually run a two, $3 million business out of here.

Right?

Yeah. The one thing I would echo that, Rick, because I think when you look at a lot of the new dental.

Setups, you know, have a coffee or whatnot, and especially if the physio is running behind or the chiro or whoever's running behind, it provides a little bit more comfort. So again, it's about patient experience. Right. I also think that if you do need to expand, it allows you to expand as well. So, you know, if we're really limited.

By space days, they've invested a lot of money for that experience. When you walk through, it's a much bigger space. It's actually quite sexy looking when you come through. So I think it's actually good to go front.

Yeah.

Like, you know, if you go to a spa like, you know, like once, like once you pay, you sit in an awaiting area. It's almost like a relaxation lounge. And so this is kind of like simulating that right now. Right.

So yeah, we start growing significantly. That waiting area becomes optional space where you could turn it into maybe two.

Yeah, No, I actually, I like it. I think, you know, in the past I would have said that I don't know why a waiting room would be separate like that But I'm looking at the style of this clinic and I actually, I actually really like it. I just think the only piece that I would look at is if you don't combine the two areas as you sort of said suggested Rick. And I just find that that receptionary is quite big for me to go into a waiting area afterwards. But I do like that. I think, you know, this staff room is a good size. Cause you're gonna have some storage space in there that you know they've got the washer and dryer. So I think this is actually a well designed layout.

Yeah.

See the thing within I like about waiting area is that like, you know, when a new patient like checks in and they register like they're pretty much spilling their guts out.

Right.

And so like there's no confidentiality there. But if you actually separate like the waiting with like reception, like, I think.

I think it makes the patient close offices. Or maybe you could move the staff room to the waiting area and then add let's say two more treatment beds. But again, this 2,400 square foot facility gives you a lot of options to expand. Again, as we talked about earlier, you could actually rent way better.

I like that.

Cool.

Okay. All right, let's give a score of 10. What do you guys think about this floor plan? Let's see what numbers are out. Oh, there's some nines. Oh, Evan likes a 10. Sweet. 9, 9, 10, 7. Okay.

8.

Okay. I'm curious who right now at their clinic actually has a separate waiting area? If you do maybe type in like a.

Yes, duplicate. Like you have five treatment, open treatment rooms there in the gym area. You could actually.

It's a bit of an investment, you know, but I do, I do, I do, I do. If you have this, if obviously you can't really afford that space at 1000 or 1500 square feet. But if you do like, I think it's something you may want to consider. Okay. There's a few years in here, Eric.

One of the other things that I find is interesting, all these floor plans, you know, in the past, it seems that PT always has this open treatment area. A lot of the Cairo treatment areas have been in a private room. But I would say in some of my past experiences when I've had a great relationship with my chiro, we've actually worked in sort of that galley system together. So I'm actually just curious, is there a lot of people that are actually moving their Cairo based practices as well into an open sort of treatment space? On the call.

Yeah, I Was talking put another five at the bottom and then have a galley style and get rid of your gym. So again, it's just options to expand.

Maybe Evan and Kate, you know, they're. They run a big clinic in Calgary and they're chiros and it's multidisciplinary.

You know, maybe part of your philosophy is that you always have a gym and that's okay too. There's nothing wrong with that. But then that's when you would look at another space. If you don't want to open up another space. Putting new curtain rooms at the bottom there. Makes sense.

I think we debated about having Cairos working in curtains, right? Oh, Ian from Hong from Asia says yes, right? Yeah. You know, and Evan's. Evan who's a Kairos is saying that for the next one they're gonna work in trip, they're gonna work in curtains.

I just think it creates.

Yeah, I'm a big fan of like maybe going like all in on making.

Your reception a really good intro, like a true interdisciplinary model. And when people are like, well who's this individual? And you can actually start really cross referring. I think it's a great opportunity.

Hey, what's your thoughts about not even having the curtain and just having the beds? You know, I see a lot of like new innovative clinics like having that now. Right?

Yeah. I got in a fight with my business partner over curtains. I prefer one curtain area because you know, just for acupuncture, things like that. But my preference is just fully open.

Okay, cool, cool. Was this helpful, guys? Did you find the floor plan section helpful? If you do maybe type yes in the chat. This was cool. Awesome. This is good. Getting really good feedback here. Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. Okay, guys, we're kind of short on time. We're gonna do overtime now. I know like it's 90 minutes in, but here, take a snapshot here. This has everything. This kind of summarize everything kind of kind of like what we talked and actually including a waiting area, making it bigger and than what most clinics do so that you actually have a bit of that retail feel.

Right.

And so, and I. But your second fight saying like it may be extra about. Over the last like 10 floor plans, we talked about having a generous reception area, like a separate waiting area room. But I think, you know, if you're running shifts and you're doing some of the stuff we talked about earlier, you're gonna have more than enough space to actually run it. Designing your schedules around shifts, you know, so that if you have, if you have three beds, you have two shifts in a day, Right. There's some questions about that. Because if you don't design, if you have for every three beds, if you don't do shifts, you only have one shift to $3 million. Business out of here, right?

Yeah. The one thing I would echo that, Rick, because I think when you look at a lot of the new dental.

Setups, does that make sense? Yeah, something like that. And if you could get rectangles, get rectangles versus squares or odd looking shapes. Staff room in the front. You want an IKEA style journey. So you put all your products, you put all your like physio, if you're dominated, physio clean. You put all your other multidisciplinary servers like in the front so that that patient walks to the end so they can see everything. If you can have a galley style open rooms, that's ideal. Have a central prepping and charting area. I really like this, like it's creating like modality, like carts these days.

They've invested a lot of money for that experience. When you walk through, it's a much bigger space. It's actually quite sexy where you actually.

Put all your consumables in there. Right. You know, so you actually don't have storage.

Right.

So it's a little custom. But like that could make it super efficient. Obviously there's tons you could do with like lighting, branding, like music, culture, putting words on your wall, social proof. And then designing the space around patient experience and staff experience, looking when you come through.

So I think it's definitely, yeah, like.

You know, if you go to a spa like, you know, like once, like once you pay, you sit in an awaiting area. It's almost like a relaxed site, you know, so that we don't have clinician burnout. All right, does everyone have a screenshot of this?

Eric, just while you're talking about the culture and the words, one of the things that I think is awesome, one of the, one of the owners in our community does it and one of the physios that I know, we're working there, they actually use a chalkboard. It's a little bit messy, but we think about going into a lot of like the, you know, the cool new restaurants as well. It's always sort of this friendly, you know, chalkboard type style. And it looks fantastic.

Lounge. And so this is kind of like simulating that right now. Right. So yeah, we thought about this floor plan. Yeah, there's a question about what is social proof. Right. So you know, like a lot of Cairos do this. Like Cairos, like we'll put like social proofs of them. Pictures with certain athletes. Or like they're putting their diplomas on the wall. Or like, maybe it's like reviews.

Right.

But like, can you put like. It's almost like a wall of like social proof of how you have like involved with community events. Right. You know, or like maybe a wall of wild. But there's a lot of things you could do in your, in your business.

Yeah, no, I actually, I like it. I think, you know, in the past I would have said that I don't know why a waiting room would.

Just to be able to create social proof that you're involved with the community and that like. And so I hope that makes sense.

It'd be separate like that. But I'm looking at the style of this clinic and I actually, I actually really like it. I just think the only piece that co.

All right. All right, so before we start our next session, I want maybe in the question mark, give us a score out of 10. How valuable are you finding? The first, like I would look at.

Is if you don't combine the two areas as you sort of suggested, Rick.

I just find that for the, for the, for the training. So far out of 10, how valuable are you finding? Nine. 10.

That receptionary is quite big for me to go into a waiting area afterwards. But I do like that. I think, you know, this stands.

Okay, cool, cool. I'm okay. If you give me one, you know, we got some. We got a seven. Okay, that's cool. But a lot of tens. A lot of tens and nines. Awesome. Thank you. All right, so let's, let's move on to the.

Afro. Is, is. Is a good size because you're gonna have some storage space in there that, you know, they've got the washer and dryer. So I think this is actually a well designed layout.

Yeah.

See the thing within I like about waiting area is that like, you know, when a new patient like checks in and they register, like they're pretty much spilling their guts out. Right. And so like, there's no confidentiality there. But if you actually separate like the waiting with like reception, like, I think, I think it makes the patient experience way better.

I like that.

Cool.

Okay. All right, let's give a score of 10. What do you guys think about this floor plan? Let's see what numbers are out. Oh, there's some nines. Oh, Evan likes a 10.

Sweet.

9, 9, 10, 7. Okay.

8.

Okay. I'm curious who right now at their clinic actually has a separate waiting area. If you do maybe type in like a yes, it's a bit of an investment, you know, but I do, I do, I do, I do. If you have this, if obviously you can't really afford that space at a thousand or fifteen hundred square feet. But if you do like, I think it's something you may want to consider. Okay. There's a few yes in here.

Erica.

Eric.

One of the other things that I find is interesting, all these floor plans, you know, in the past it seems that PT always has this open treatment area and a lot of the Cairo treatment areas have been in a private room. But I would say in some of my past experiences when I've had a great relationship with my Cairo, we've actually worked in sort of that galley system together. So I'm actually just curious, is there a lot of people that are actually moving their Cairo based practices as well into an open sort of treatment space? On the call.

Yeah. I was talking to Evan and Kate. You know, they run a big clinic in Calgary and they're Kairos and it's multidisciplinary. You know, I think we debated about having Kairos working in curtains, right? Oh, Ian from Hong from Asia says yes, right?

Yeah.

You know, Evan's Evan, who's a Cairo is saying that for the next one they're going to work in trip, they're going to work in curtains.

I just think it creates a really good internal, like a true interdisciplinary model. And when people are like, well who's this individual? And you can actually start really cross referring. I think it's a great opportunity.

Hey, what's your thoughts about not even having the curtain and just having the beds? You know, I see a lot of like new innovative clinics like having that now, right?

Yeah, I got in a fight with my business partner over curtains. I prefer one curtain area because, you know, just for acupuncture, things like that. But my preference is just fully open.

Okay, cool, cool. Was this helpful guys? Did you find the floor plan section helpful? If you do maybe type yes in the chat. This was cool. Awesome. This is good. Getting really good feedback here. Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. Okay guys, we're kind of short on time. We're going to do overtime now. I know it's 90 minutes in, but here, take a snapshot here. This has everything, just kind of summarize everything. Kind of like what we talked about over the last 10 floor plans. We talked about having a generous reception area, like a separate waiting area, designing your schedules around shifts so that if you have three beds, you have two shifts in a day, right? There's some questions about that. Because if you don't design, if you have for every three beds, if you don't do shifts, you only have one shift.

Right.

Does that make sense? Yeah, something like that. And if you could get rectangles, get rectangles versus squares or odd looking shapes. Staff room in the front. You want an IKEA style journey. So you put all your products, you put all your physio, if you're predominantly a physio clinic, you put all your other multidisciplinary servers in the front so that that patient walks to the end so they can see everything. If you can have a galley style open rooms, that's ideal. Have a central prepping and charting area. I really like this. It's creating modality carts where you actually put all your consumables in there. So you actually don't have storage. Right. So it's a little custom, but like that could make it super efficient. Obviously there's tons you could do with like lighting, branding, like music, culture, putting words on your wall, social proof, and then designing the space around patient experience and staff experience, you know, so that we don't have clinician burnout. All right, does everyone have a screenshot of this?

Eric, just while you're talking about the culture and the words, one of the things that I think is awesome, one of the owners in our community does it and one of the physios that I know working there, they actually use a chalkboard. It's a little bit messy, but when you think about going into a lot of like the, you know, the cool new restaurants as well, it's always sort of this friendly, you know, chalkboard type style and it looks fantastic in their clinic.

Yeah.

There's a question about what is social proof. Right. So, you know, like a lot of Cairos do this. Like Cairos will put like social proofs of them, pictures with certain athletes. Or like they're putting their diplomas on the wall. Or like maybe it's like reviews. Right. But like, can you put like, it's almost like a wall of like social proof of how you have like involved with community events.

Right.

You know, or like maybe a wall of. Wow. But there's a lot of things you could do in your business to be able to create social proof that you're involved with the community and that like. And so I hope that makes sense. Cool. All right. All right, so before we start our next session, I want maybe in the question box, give us a score out of 10, how valuable are you finding? The first? Like, for the. For the. For the training so far. Out of ten, how valuable are you finding? Nine tens. Okay, cool, cool. I'm okay. If you give me one, you know, we got some. Got a seven. Okay, that's cool. But a lot of tens. A lot of tens and nines. Awesome. Thank you. All right, so let's. Let's move on to the.