Outpatient Therapy Services at Ochsner Lafayette General

Physical therapy helps to assess, correct, improve or prevent conditions that affect balance, endurance, movement or strength. During physical therapy sessions, your physical therapist will help you learn more about your condition and teach ways to prevent injuries, work with you on exercises to improve strength, flexibility, balance and coordination, and discuss strategies to help with pain management.

Providers commonly recommend physical therapy when you are managing certain illnesses or recovering from medical events, injuries or surgeries, including:

• Amputation

• Cancer treatment

• Concussion and other traumatic brain injuries

• Injury due to an accident or fall

• Joint replacement

• Spinal cord injury

• Sports injury

• Stroke

Infants and children with developmental delays may also follow treatment plans that include physical therapy. Regular physical therapy can help them cultivate new skills and reach their highest potential.

Occupational therapy helps people learn, relearn, make adaptations or use adaptive equipment to independently tend to the functions of daily living. Occupational therapy can be helpful if you are managing or recovering from injuries or long-term illnesses, neurological disorders or physical disabilities.

Depending on a person’s age, lifestyle and goals, occupational therapy might address activities such as:

• Bathing

• Cooking

• Doing laundry

• Dressing

• Eating

• Following a daily routine

• Paying attention at school

• Playing

Anyone having significant difficulty doing an activity they need or want to do may benefit from occupational therapy, and infants and children with developmental delays also benefit from occupational therapy.

Speech therapy, also called speech-language pathology, assesses, prevents and treats conditions and issues related to communication, language, speech, feeding and swallowing. Speech therapists also focus on the processing and thinking skills needed for communication.

You may benefit from speech therapy if you receive a medical treatment that affects the mouth, neck or throat, or if you are living with a long-term health condition, a developmental disability, a neurological disorder or other physical disorders.

Infants and children often receive speech therapy due to developmental delays, hearing loss or physical conditions, such as a cleft lip, cleft palate or tongue-tie. Tongue-tie, or ankyloglossia, is a condition where a band of tissue prevents full movement of the tongue. Children with congenital or developmental disabilities, like autism spectrum disorders or Down syndrome, can also benefit from speech therapy.

Ochsner and MTS Physical Therapy & Wellness outpatient therapists provide a range of specialized equipment, programs and services, including:

• AlterG anti-gravity treadmills — specialized treadmills that allow you to walk without putting weight on your lower extremities, like your legs and your feet

• Aquatic therapy — exercises in the water

• Cold laser therapy — a noninvasive laser therapy that promotes healing and reduces pain

• Concussion rehabilitation

• Dry needling — a treatment in which a trained therapist inserts a very thin needle into the muscles to treat pain and movement issues

• Feeding therapy for infants and children, which may be done by an occupational therapist or speech therapist

• Treatment of lymphedema in the head and neck area — a build-up of fluid in the body that is often caused by cancer treatment

• Modified barium swallow study — an X-ray test that allows a doctor to evaluate for swallowing or eating issues

• Pelvic floor therapy — therapy to strengthen the muscles of the pelvis and improve issues such as incontinence, painful sex, pregnancy pain, postpartum pain and more

To make an appointment with an outpatient therapist, you need a referral from your provider. If you are recovering from an illness, injury or surgery, your provider will likely make a referral automatically. You can also talk with your primary care provider or specialist for a referral to outpatient therapy.

Once a referral has been made, a member of our outpatient therapy services team will reach out to you to schedule your first therapy appointment. You do not need to worry about calling or going online to make an appointment.

Ochsner’s electronic health record system allows providers to communicate with one another whether they are in the same office or across the state. Your outpatient therapist will have access to your health records and primary care provider’s or specialist’s notes. The therapist will also record details about your outpatient therapy treatment plan. The therapist will take notes during therapy sessions so your primary care provider or specialist can monitor your condition and progress while you are receiving outpatient therapy services.

Depending on your unique therapy needs, you can choose from several locations, or you may need to go to a specific outpatient therapy location. The care team will let you know where to go when they call you to schedule your first outpatient therapy appointment.

Outpatient therapy locations:

• Ochsner Abrom Kaplan Memorial Hospital

• Ochsner University Hospital & Clinics

• Ochsner St. Martin Hospital

• Ochsner Lafayette General Orthopedic Hospital

You may receive outpatient therapy services at one of the other MTS Physical Therapy & Wellness locations. Though these clinics are not onsite at Ochsner locations, they are connected to Ochsner providers through the electronic health record system. This allows for seamless care between all locations.