The Department of Education’s proposed loan cap changes have sparked strong reactions across healthcare, including within occupational therapy and physical therapy circles.

Much of the conversation has focused on whether these degrees should be classified as “professional degrees” versus “graduate programs.”
But that may be the wrong fight.

In this episode, we zoom out and ask three deeper questions about the economics of certain healthcare education programs— questions that matter far more than federal loan labels.

Whether the DOE calls us “professional” or not doesn’t change the structural issues facing our professions.

What we cover in this episode:
-Why Has the Cost of Healthcare Education Become So Disconnected from Salary?
-The gap between education cost and earning power continues to widen.
-Why Have Clinical Salaries Been Flat (or Declining) in Real Terms?
-How tightening margins have forced productivity demands higher in clinical settings.
-Why we need to focus on making healthcare degrees a valuable financial investment, rather than career fields with negative ROIs

Full episode note: https://rehabupracticesolutions.com/better-outcomes-165

Podcast: https://www.betteroutcomes.show
Get the Book: https://amzn.to/3M2UZ6x
Book a call with me: https://calendly.com/rehabu/discovery
Connect with Me: https://www.rafisalazar.com

If you'd like to learn more about Strata EMR & RCM and achieving a 99.99% reimbursement rate for your PT, OT, or SLP Clinic head over to stratapt.com and book a demo with their team!

RTM & Virtual Service Delivery Isn’t a Billing Add-On — It’s the Future of Healthcare Delivery

In this episode, I break down one of the biggest misconceptions in modern rehab: the idea that Remote Therapeutic Monitoring (RTM) and virtual service delivery is just a billing perk, a revenue booster, or a marketing gimmick. It’s not. RTM and virtual services represent the next era of healthcare delivery— a shift toward hybrid, patient-centered, digitally augmented care that extends the clinician’s impact far beyond the clinic walls.

In this episode, I explain why RTM and virtual matters, how it’s changing the role of clinicians, why patients now expect hybrid models, and why CMS is actively incentivizing it. If you’re a clinician, clinic owner, healthcare leader, or digital health innovator, this episode will challenge the way you think about care delivery.

What we cover in this Episode:

-Why RTM is NOT just a revenue strategy
-The shift towards hybrid care
-What today's patients expect from their care
-How virtual healthcare & RTM elevate clinicians into their highest-value roles
-Why CMS is incentivizing services like RTM and what it signals

Full episode note: https://rehabupracticesolutions.com/better-outcomes-164

Podcast: https://www.betteroutcomes.show
Get the Book: https://amzn.to/3M2UZ6x
Book a call with me: https://calendly.com/rehabu/discovery
Connect with Me: https://www.rafisalazar.com

If you'd like to learn more about Strata EMR & RCM and achieving a 99.99% reimbursement rate for your PT, OT, or SLP Clinic head over to stratapt.com and book a demo with their team!

How do you actually get better — as a clinician, a business owner, or a leader? It’s not more school, another certification, or reading one more article. It’s reps.

In this episode, I break down the single biggest piece of advice I give new clinicians (and anyone moving into leadership or entrepreneurship): your education is just your ticket to play — expertise comes from getting reps.

We’ll explore:

Why formal education is only the starting line, not the finish line

How repeated exposure to patient cases sharpens pattern recognition and clinical decision-making

What it really means to turn experience into wisdom through reflection

Why this “reps + reflection” framework applies equally to business and leadership — hiring, marketing, launching new services

Practical ways to accelerate growth in any career path without waiting years for confidence to catch up

Why This Matters

Confidence isn’t built in a classroom — it’s built in the field, one decision at a time.

Business & leadership skills develop the same way as clinical ones — through lived experience and iteration.

If you’re feeling “stuck” or unsure, the solution isn’t another credential — it’s getting in the game and stacking reps.

Listen to the Episode to Hear …

How to intentionally extract lessons from each patient, project, or business challenge

Personal stories from my early days as a clinician and later as an entrepreneur

Simple strategies to speed up growth without burning out — journaling, mentorship, and deliberate practice

Encouragement to stop waiting for perfection and just start doing the work

Full episode note: https://rehabupracticesolutions.com/better-outcomes-163

Podcast: https://www.betteroutcomes.show
Get the Book: https://amzn.to/3M2UZ6x
Book a call with me: https://calendly.com/rehabu/discovery
Connect with Me: https://www.rafisalazar.com

If you'd like to learn more about Strata EMR & RCM and achieving a 99.99% reimbursement rate for your PT, OT, or SLP Clinic head over to stratapt.com and book a demo with their team!

In this episode of the Better Outcomes Show, we take a look at a recent conversation on LinkedIn about the steep decline in occupational therapy (and physical therapy) school applications.

A post by Sarah Lyon raised an important question: Why are fewer students choosing OT, and what does that mean for the future of the profession?

In response, Rafi shared several factors that may be contributing to the decline — and in this episode, he unpacks those ideas in more detail.

What we cover in this episode:
- Why confusion about OT entry-level requirements (Master’s vs. OTD) is discouraging prospective applicants.
- How rising tuition and questionable ROI impact PT/OT’s attractiveness compared to other health professions.
- The role of corporate healthcare and private equity in fueling burnout — and how that shapes the profession’s reputation.
- Why other clinical degrees often carry higher compensation ceilings and broader leadership opportunities.
- What these trends mean for the future — and why this might actually be a unique opportunity for new students entering PT/OT now.

If you'd like to learn more about Strata EMR & RCM and achieving a 99.99% reimbursement rate for your PT, OT, or SLP Clinic head over to stratapt.com and book a demo with their team!

Finding the Thread – Humanizing Healthcare Across a Career

Have you ever looked back on your career and tried to connect the dots?
For a long time, I thought my resume looked like a series of “rabbit holes” in healthcare—clinical care, academia, management consulting, strategy work, practice ownership. At the time, each move felt like simply saying “yes” to an opportunity.

But a recent conversation with a prospective client made me pause. They said, “I can see a common thread running through everything you’ve done.”

That led me to reflect on the last 13 years of my career… and I realized they were right.

The thread? Humanizing the healthcare experience.
In this episode, I share the story of discovering that throughline, what it means for me today, and why humanizing healthcare isn’t just a personal mission—it’s a necessity for our industry.

What We Cover in This Episode:
- The winding path of my career: from clinician to consultant to practice owner.
- How a client conversation sparked the realization of a unifying theme.
- Why “healthcare is a human experience” became more than a phrase—it became my mission.
- The risks of reducing patients to checklists, protocols, and data points.
- How technology and operations should be used: to create space for real human connection.
- A framework you can use to find your own “common thread.”

Why It Matters
Healthcare often gets lost in efficiency metrics, compliance checkboxes, and bottom lines. But patients—and clinicians—need meaning, connection, and human presence. By stepping back and asking what ties our careers and choices together, we can refocus on what really drives us and the work we do.

Full episode note: https://rehabupracticesolutions.com/better-outcomes-160

Podcast: https://www.betteroutcomes.show
Get the Book: https://amzn.to/3M2UZ6x
Book a call with me: https://calendly.com/rehabu/discovery
Connect with Me: https://www.rafisalazar.com

If you'd like to learn more about Strata EMR & RCM and achieving a 99.99% reimbursement rate for your PT, OT, or SLP Clinic head over to stratapt.com and book a demo with their team!

Healthcare Disrupted: Why the Next Big Innovation Won’t Come From Healthcare

In this episode of the Better Outcomes Show, we dive into a bold prediction about the future of healthcare: The next wave of real innovation — the kind that transforms how we deliver care, engage patients, and improve outcomes — won’t come from within the healthcare industry.

Instead, it will come from outside.

Tech giants like Amazon, Apple, Walmart, and others are entering the healthcare space not to play by the traditional rules, but to rewrite them. They’re not dependent on fee-for-service reimbursement or burdened by legacy EMR infrastructure. They’re consumer-first, data-driven, and laser-focused on convenience and outcomes — not billing codes.

So, what does this mean for providers, practice owners, and healthcare leaders?

It means the time to adapt is now.

What we cover in this episode:
-Why the healthcare industry is structurally incapable of disrupting itself
-How tech giants are positioned to lead the next wave of care innovation
-The business models these companies are using — and how they differ from traditional healthcare
-What small-to-mid-sized providers can do to stay relevant and competitive
-How to rethink your value proposition outside of third-party payer systems
-Where the opportunities lie for independent clinics to innovate at the edges

Full episode note: https://rehabupracticesolutions.com/better-outcomes-160

Podcast: https://www.betteroutcomes.show
Get the Book: https://amzn.to/3M2UZ6x
Book a call with me: https://calendly.com/rehabu/discovery
Connect with Me: https://www.rafisalazar.com

If you'd like to learn more about Strata EMR & RCM and achieving a 99.99% reimbursement rate for your PT, OT, or SLP Clinic head over to stratapt.com and book a demo with their team!

Can you use Free Healthcare to build a profitable business?

What if you gave away your clinical services… for free? Not as charity. Not as a one-time promo. But as an actual business model. I recently revisited Chris Anderson’s book Free: The Future of a Radical Price. I read it in 2013 and recently picked it back up — and it got me thinking: How could we apply this to healthcare? The cost of delivering digital care (videos, plans, consults) is rapidly approaching (nearly) zero.

That opens the door to radically different care delivery models — ones that lower access barriers and still generate real revenue. So, in this episode, I dive into ways that clinicians could build a profitable business offering free healthcare services.

In a world where trust, access, and attention are more valuable than ever. Offering “free” services could be a strategic move — not a loss. For clinicians willing to rethink their model, there’s real opportunity here. Curious — if you had to give away your clinical services for free,
what would you monetize instead? Shoot me an email if you've got some ideas!

What we cover in this Episode:

-How a Freemium model could work in delivering healthcare services
-The idea of a Cross-Subsidy model for private practice healthcare services
-Membership models, like Direct Primary Care
-Sponsorships or Ad-based Healthcare services
-Data Exchange & Research Recruitment Models

Full episode note: https://rehabupracticesolutions.com/better-outcomes-159

Podcast: https://www.betteroutcomes.show
Get the Book: https://amzn.to/3M2UZ6x
Book a call with me: https://calendly.com/rehabu/discovery
Connect with Me: https://www.rafisalazar.com

If you'd like to learn more about Strata EMR & RCM and achieving a 99.99% reimbursement rate for your PT, OT, or SLP Clinic head over to stratapt.com and book a demo with their team!

Real Healthcare Innovators Read Outside of Healthcare

I covered this topic in a LinkedIn article recently, but thought the idea of reading outside of healthcare warranted its own podcast episode. Here's the main idea: if you want to be truly innovative in healthcare, you need to read outside of healthcare. Being well-informed in your field is just the baseline. Everyone should be doing that. What often sets leaders and innovators apart stems from their ability to take insights and ideas from outside their field and apply it to their industry.

You’d be surprised at how often ideas from seemingly unrelated fields can unlock new ways of thinking about your own work. A story about survival in the Alaskan wilderness might teach you more about resilience and process management than the latest leadership manual. A deep dive into the history of jazz might shift your perspective on improvisation and problem-solving in ways that no business podcast could.

The more I read outside the typical business playbooks, the more I’m convinced: if you want to stand out in your field, you sometimes have to look beyond it.

What we cover in this Episode:

-Why reading outside of your industry provides unique insights that can be applied to healthcare
-How reading broadly can help you communicate, lead and innovate in healthcare
-The reason that innovation to the industry will come from outside of healthcare
-A few of the recent books I've read and the insights I pulled from them that applied to healthcare

Full episode note: https://rehabupracticesolutions.com/better-outcomes-158

Learn More: https://rehabupracticesolutions.com
Podcast: https://www.betteroutcomes.show
Get the Book: https://amzn.to/3M2UZ6x
Book a call with me: https://calendly.com/rehabu/discovery
Connect with Me: https://www.rafisalazar.com

If you'd like to learn more about Strata EMR & RCM and achieving a 99.99% reimbursement rate for your PT, OT, or SLP Clinic head over to stratapt.com and book a demo with their team!