COVID or the Coronavirus has had a massive impact on health care, which will have long lasting repercussions. The fact is this will cause a shifting of health care resources from somewhat glamour fields of health care to more nuts and bolts. We see it everyday with more and more layoffs in health care related fields. Needless to say fields that are not essential for treating the virus are going to take a hit. Now some fields have some adaptation that they can make such as: psychiatry, mental health. These fields can easily adapt to telemedicine. However fields that require close contact and physical examination maybe in big trouble. Fields that are heavily dependent on procedure codes are also at high risk.
5. Physical and Occupational Therapy– These have been the golden fields for a long time. But now they are about take a hit. How much of hit is unknown. The fact is a lot of their patients come from elective procedures that have more or less stopped for the last two months. Even when they come back they will most likely be heavily reduced. This is going to lead to massive decrease in the need for Physical Therapists. Further, COVID is probably going to lead a reduction in provider to patient interaction. The idea of having physical interaction with a provider 3 times a week for 4 weeks may not be possible for years. This is going to require a massive adjustment to the entire Physical Therapy business plan.
4. Plastic Surgeons– Really any group of physicians that are dependent on elective procedures are going to have serious cutbacks. Not only are hospitals reducing how many procedures they are doing, there is going to be a reduction in people’s ability to actually afford to have the procedures done. Needless to say 20% unemployment is not going to lead to a rush of people wanting to have their breasts enlarged or facelifts.
3. Massage Therapists– Massage Therapists are really in the crucible here. They are a profession that requires an immense amount of patients to provider contact but also disposable income for people to pay for the treatments. Needless to say this is most likely not going to happen. Most Massage Therapists may be looking a year to a year and half of no income. It’s really hard to see patients and people prioritizing massage therapy appointments over eating food.
2. Podiatrists– Podiatrists are a profession heavily dependent on elective procedures, especially surgical procedures. They also get the majority of their patients from high risk COVID population groups. Due to the COVID shutdown a lot of Podiatrists patients are just not going to keep their appointments. They are also going to have a hard time scheduling and preforming elective surgical procedures. Many Podiatrists are going to see a 50-60% revenue hit.
1. Chiropractors– I just have no idea how Chiropractors survive this. Again, a profession that requires physical contact three times a week for three weeks and requires people to have disposable income; almost impossible to perform via telemedicine. This is the perfect storm for a lot of Chiropractors to lose their business and that is unfortunate.