The state of Hawaii is an unrestricted Direct Access State’s, meaning a patient may receive physical therapy without a referral from another healthcare provider. According to the American Physical Therapy Association, physical therapist’s are qualified to evaluate a patient to determine if their condition is beyond a physical therapist’s scope of practice. If it is felt your condition is out of your physical therapists scope of practice, a referral will be made to the appropriate healthcare provider.

While kegels are one type of pelvic floor exercise, therapy often includes a range of exercises tailored to your needs. As a pelvic floor physical therapist, I look at all contributing factors to your symptoms including bowel/ bladder behaviors, low back, hip, abdominal muscles, and various other soft tissue structures, along with your pelvic floor muscles.

No, an internal examination is not always required. It depends on your specific condition, symptoms, and your comfort level. While internal examination may be recommended in follow up treatments to receive more extensive information to best treat your symptoms, we will discuss the need for internal examination with you and ensure your comfort and consent prior to one being completed.

Follow up visits typically are 60 minutes. Frequency of visits is recommended by your therapist at the initial evaluation. Typically patients are seen once per week to start and will taper as you are improving and we are moving towards symptom elimination and improving your overall confidence in yourself and abilities.

The timeline varies depending on your symptoms, the reason for your symptoms, and how long you have been dealing with these symptoms. It can take up to 2-3 visits to get all the moving pieces to your puzzle, but you will be started day 1 with things to start doing at home. For most it takes 3-4 visits to start seeing improvements. Once we have seen your symptoms reduce significantly or resolve completely, we will be reducing our frequency of seeing each other with check ins for progression of your current plan and promotion of continued progressed, understanding the true underlying WHY to your issues and working on that to see forever improvement. Pelvic floor issues can be a problem with strength, coordination, or relaxation issues that will take time to resolve. Your therapist will tell you what to expect with your symptoms, your body, and their recommendation after your initial assessment. It is recommended to be seen up to 6-8 visits even if symptom resolution happened in 2-3 visits in order progress your program to prevent any re-occurrence in the future. Our goal is that you aren’t just discharge because your symptoms are resolved, but that all of your contributing factors and your underlying WHY to your symptoms has been resolved to see the lasting results you are looking for.

If you’ve ever been to a run of the mill outpatient physical therapy clinic, you know that you may be 1 of 4 patients that your therapist is seeing in an hour. At Pacific Pelvic Health we get the pleasure of providing one-on-one care without limitations from health insurance companies and without being passed down to an aide that has no idea how to help you. This can be done in the comfort of your own home as an option which eliminates travel and wait times for you and allows your therapist to create a treatment plan that can be individualized to what you have available in your own environment. We do have a clinic option as well. Anya not only has her Doctorate in Physical Therapy, but she also is a Certified Strength and Conditioning Specialist, and has received all of her pelvic health rehabilitation certifications from Herman and Wallace Institute. This allows her to be well versed in treating higher level female athletes who often get told to just stop exercising all together. Anya strives to provide each of her patients with a treatment plan that leaves them symptom free, feeling in control of their body, and confident that they can manage and stave off issues independently. She makes sure to provide a hands on approach, with education on your body and it’s anatomy, and a gradual transition to a program guided to meet your goals.