Exercise Training Center at UW Medical Center - Roosevelt

Jun 2023

Of my 5 visits here so far I've been very impressed with staff professionalism. Repeated scheduling can be frustrating during a slow ongoing healing process but I've always felt staff go above and beyond to try to make the journey easier.

Mar 2023

I've been going to M Caraig and his assistant since December to care for my knee injury. He's really good at the whole process of identifying exactly where something hurts and how much, how much mobility there is in a joint, where muscles are below full strength, and tracking changes between sessions. He also does a great job of explaining exactly what exercises to do to heal injuries and strengthen muscles around an injury to prevent further injury. He has exercises for the gym, and home alternatives for days when I can't get to the gym. And his attitude is friendly and encouraging, kind of like a gym physical trainer except focused on healing specific injuries and preventing further injury.The facility itself is equipped like a combination of a gym and a medical facility, and the gear all appears to be in excellent condition (except that the teaching skeleton has a cracked skull).The administrative people are friendly and efficient, and they have a phone number that bypasses the often-slow main switchboard of the UW Medical system.The only negative is that appointments can be kind of scarce, but that seems to be a universal problem in anything medical since the pandemic started. I think it's busy because it's good.Background: how did I get here?Last August, I somehow managed to tear my knee meniscus cartilage, just by showing my boy how to pop a wheelie on his bike. No fall or anything, just sudden pain when I demonstrated. It wasn't even a very good wheelie!Anyway I got initial treatment from UW Urgent Care, a diagnosis from a for-profit knee clinic soon after, and a second opinion from a UW sports medicine doctor in November (busy place!), and the latter referred me to the Exercise Training Center. (They offered referrals closer to home, but I wanted to stay in the UW Medical system if possible.)Summary: I haven't been to a lot of physical therapy facilities, just this one for myself and a couple of others I saw during my wife's appointments. This place is the best, so I don't think a five-star "Yay, best ever" is grade inflation.

Nov 2020

Between scheduling mistakes (more than half the time, this place scheduled my next appt on a the wrong day - and not the day I was told/we agreed upon), having my provider insinuate that I was faking or something and didn't need (or deserve? it was a weird vibe) his expertise, and generally feeling blown off, this is the worst PT experience I've ever had. I also had to wait over 3 weeks sometimes because of their scheduling incompetence. I wasn't even able to complete my course of treatment due to the aforementioned schedule issues. I complained to UW's patient services, but will have to go back to my PCP and ask for a referral to a different clinic. Two stars because...read full review