UCSF Physical Therapy Dept

I was referred to UCSF physical therapy after giving birth at UCSF for some hip pain issues. While I can highly recommend UCSF for pregnancy, birth, and postpartum, I would NEVER recommend their physical therapy department.
I received a call after my referral. Then I called back, and left a message. They never answer the phone in the physical therapy department, which is really frustrating because it extends what would be (albeit a long wait on a) phone call to several days of phone tag. Strike 1.
I was able to finally connect in-​person with the man who had called. He informed me that the first available appointment was 1.5 months out. A month and a half? Did I really have to wait that long? I was pretty uncomfortable. «Yes, the woman who would see you is only here once a week.» He did say that I should try Mt. Zion’s physical therapy department, but I couldn’t book and appointment with Mission Bay because I could only be a patient with one or the other. And here we go again, more phone calls, more forever-​holds waiting to speak to someone… Strike 2.
So I called Mt. Zion and was informed that I had to be a primary care patient with the Women’s health clinic in order to receive physical therapy there. They seemed surprised that Mission Bay didn’t know this, but they would ask and see if they could accommodate me, and they would call me back as soon as they had the answer. I never heard back from Mt. Zion. Strike 3.
Then I called Mission Bay back, and left yet another message explaining the situation and requesting that someone call me back to schedule that appointment for 1.5 months out. They never called me back. Strike 4.
You can’t say I didn’t try to give you my business. I tried really hard to get an appointment. Even if I could get an appointment now I wouldn’t want one. This experience has been ridiculous, the amount of time I spent on the phone, leaving messages, watching my phone like a hawk so I wouldn’t miss their call… And for absolutely nothing.
Horrendous customer service. I would NEVER recommend UCSF physical therapy to anyone.

I walked in here in loads of physical pain. The reception staff were lovely. I was called in by my Physical Therapist and from the moment we met I felt comfortable with here. The Physical Therapy Centre is like a gym/​playground. There is light coming in from the windows. Atmospherically I love it.
My Physical Therapist spent lots of time with me and seemed to have found the problems I am facing physically. I see my Physical Therapist once a week and ever week I see improvements. The scheduling is fantastic and I am impressed and delighted with the services at the Mission Bay physical therapy recovery centre.
The UCSF shuttle system is super convenient.

I totally agree with S. Afreen. Frankly, going once every week if I am lucky, perhaps once every two weeks is useless. They spend a half an hour with you showing you excercizes to do at home. You know what doing these excercizes do to you? They completely reaggravates your injury and they are NOT there to help you afterward. I have had no stretching no massage no NOTHING. Hey– if you’re lucky they’ll give you a student to work with that will completely and inappropriately give you a weight to use that will also reaagravate the injury. Do yourself a favor and go somewhere else!

I am very satisfied with my sessions with Kathy! I have a terrible upper chest muscle strain! Ive been doing sessions with her for a couple months now! The therapy is really helping me because I was in alot of pain! I feel alot better! Thanks Kathy

I was scheduled to see Hidelisa C. Manibusan, she came to get me 15 mins late and spent less than 10 mins with me on the floor and kept on looking at the clock the entire time. My 30 min apt ended up being less than 15 mins. There were no ice packs, no warm up, she ended up aggravating my sore back even more. I don’t recommend going to her.

RAMI WEINBURG DPT UCSF — 500 Stars — GREAT with serious injures and amputees. He has a HUGE skill set and is a FANTASTIC problem solver. This location is one of the best medical centers anywhere, with truly world class providers and doctors. I use Prosthetics and Surgeons there too. It is very helpful to have them all under one roof.
UCSF is well known for excellent providers. They have a desire to learn how to help, to be open to the unique issues of their patients. I have had several UCSF Providers and all of them spent great time working to understand and therefor help me. The Physical Therapy Department is also geared that way, they spend a lot of time working with you. It is unlike any other medical center I’ve been to.
I would recommend UCSF PT Mission Bay to anyone with a disabling injury where you need to use a scooter, walker, or wheelchair. Many SF Hospitals and medical centers are difficult, even dangerous for wheeled patients. This place has zero obstacles and usually plenty of parking (in rear) on nice flat ground. $ 3 – 10

After 8 appointments, I’m not happy with my experience here. I had knee surgery this summer and I have been to other physical therapists in other cities in the past so I had a reference point for this judgement. My appointments were only 30 minutes, once a week, and I don’t feel like they were comprehensive or efficient. Generally, we would spend 5 – 10 minutes stretching my knee (working on range of motion), 15 minutes doing active exercises, and then the remaining 5 – 10 minutes going over what I should be doing at home, where sometimes the physical therapist is just typing up your instructions while you sit there. It wasn’t an effective use of my time. Over the entire 10 weeks, they never iced me. They used electric stimulation once. I always did my exercises at home, and I honestly felt like I got more out of my at home exercises than the appointments – they just felt like check-​ins. I’ve started going to a new physical therapist and I’m so glad I switched to another practice because now I know for sure I wasn’t getting everything I needed from this experience.

After spine surgery, I was lucky enough to be referred to Steve Noveshen for physical therapy. Steve has the perfect temperament for working with people at various stages of disability/​rehab. For me, he knew exactly how to push me out of my protective comfort zone. I was anxious coming out of back surgery, but Steve was reassuring the entire way with his incredible knowledge of the body AND his keen intuition about my body, specifically. I highly recommend you seek out Steve Noveshen for physical therapy.

You literally cannot get a hold of ANYONE here. The front desk enrollment for new patients, follow up appointment scheduling — it doesn’t matter. If someone does actually pick up the phone, they put you on hold and never pick up again. As I need to schedule PT several times /​week following ACL surgery, this is obviously a non-​starter.
The appointments are 30 mins long which in my opinion is not enough time to get your evaluation and perform your exercises in front of the PT (and get feedback which is important). This is particularly the case if the PT shows up late (which happened about 30% of the time).
Three stars because I do think the people here are very competent, the facility is new with good equipment and they do not use trainers to supplement their PTs. You can definitely find better though…

I worked with Erin Green for a right adductor tear, and she was amazing! They take great care of their patients and the facility is amazing. She offered a wide variety of exercises and therapeutic options that helped me get back to my dance classes in 6 weeks. I couldn’t have asked for a better experience,

Best physical therapy hands down. Betsy, Theresa, and David do an amazing job!

This is the best physical therapy practice ever. Super skilled therapists who are also really kind.

HIGHLY VARIABLE EXPERIENCE.
This place is simultaneously spectacular and enraging. It’s UCSF, they have the best surgeons and the most experienced and educated DPTs working on you. But at the same time there are some MAJOR kinks in what should be a smooth-​running, flawless system.
First of all, this is a freaking ORTHOPEDIC INSTITUTE. Helloooooo, do you know what that means, oh genius 260 Step score 38+ MCAT having UCSF planning department??? It means you have a consistent patient population of NON AMBULATORY AND SEMI AMBULATORY WITH ASSIST people coming daily to your door. PUT A FREAKING RAMP UP THE FRONT CURB. It is simply unconscionable that UCSF lacked the foresight to put an adequate patient loading zone with a handicap ramp in front of the building at an orthopaedic surgery and physical therapy center. It’s Mission Bay, for cripes sake. Claim you don’t have enough room to add another 10′ to have a space for cars and taxis to pull off to the side and unload onto a ramp? Just add some more landfill to the bay and there ya go. Where the patients have to load and unload now is a nightmare. People have to pull over in the middle of Owens Street and drop off people in a storm drain gutter (LITERALLY, there is a gutter drain right in front of the door… do you know how hazardous this is to navigate past holes in teh street when you’re on crutches?) and then over a 9″ curb. I see kyphotic little old ladies struggling to get up and over this curb on a daily basis without killing themselves.
Second of all, the front desk staff is… highly variable. You catch them on a good day, everyone is happy, cheery, friendly, joking around, being kind and friendly to the patients, la di dah super happy such a wonderful place to be! You catch them on a bad day and FEAR THE WRATH OF THEIR BAD MOOD. God forbid you come during shift change or lunch hour or when too many of them are on break or too many people are calling and on hold on the phone lines because lord they do NOT want you in their face trying to schedule your appointment, settle your copay or getting your therapy! I’ve seen one of the receptionists actually roll his eyes at a patient who was trying to schedule a followup. I get it, it sucks to work a busy desk and trying to schedule appointments but man, have some customer service skills and professionalism.
Thirdly: PARKING. IT SUCKS HERE! If you’re a patient here, you probably paid $ 40,000 of your insurance money for surgery already. Why do they have to rape you every time you come for another $ 8 of parking? Also, at a place where a lot of HANDICAPPED people come, they actually make the handicapped people pay to park as well, which is in-​congruent with the rest of the state of California and city of San Francisco, where handicapped spots are free. Shrewd move, UCSF… way to money grub people who can barely walk out of that extra $ 5. ALSO, it is really thoughtless and crappy planning on their part to place the meters where you have to pay and buy your tickets in the middle of the lot AWAY from the handicapped spots… which means the poor handicapped people have to schlep on their crutches, walkers, canes, etc all the way past their car, back AWAY from the building, go over to the meter, buy their ticket, and then hobble back to their car and screw around leaving the ticket THEN go to the building. When you’re 2 weeks post-​op and worry you’re going to fall walking 10 feet and reinjure your delicately and carefully repaired extremity and undo all of that hard and expensive work by the talented orthopaedic surgeons, that extra 15 feet of walking you’re forced to do so you won’t get a ticket truly does suck.
Along the lines of parking: Public transit to this location (and all of the Mission Bay campus for that matter) is NON EXISTENT. I’ve heard other patients ranting in the reception area about what lack of patient empathy that displays because anybody who is unfortunate to have to rely on public transit to get here… just isn’t going to be able to come. Not displaying those patient care values of accessibility for all if we’re locating our shiny new building inside a public transit dead zone, eh?
If you’re going to call a taxi for your trip here, expect to pay at least $ 20 per trip to get from any part of SF AND wait at least 30 minutes for them to show up.
Next: the physical therapists themselves are really polarized. Some are AWESOME & blow you away with how amazing they are or they suck. I’ve had incredible ones who I am completely devoted to and other ones who are very burnt out and just going through the motions.
Final bad point: Scheduling. It sucks here. Yet, I’ll them a pass on this because they are UCSF and generally in very high demand with awesome practitioners so… thems the breaks. But schedule EARLY and try not to have a 9 – 5 job if you want to come here because most openings are at … say 2pm on a Tues

I recently switched over to UCSF for physical therapy and my experience has been very positive!
Not only is this a new, beautiful, clean, and well-​kept PT clinic, but all of the therapists are so friendly and helpful. Even if you are not their patient, they will smile and say hello. Facility is truly state of the art, with well equipped technology and equipments. My therapist even had a visual body app on his ipad that was able to show me different muscular movements and how each muscle worked. You can tell they’ve invested a lot of time and money into this department, in efforts to help accelerate each patient’s recovery.
My only grip is the scheduling process. It took a few weeks before I was able to get my first appointment in, but right after my first appointment, I was able to get appointments in with my therapist pretty regularly (at least once a week). Appointment hours are great too, I’ve been able to schedule appointments as late as 6 in the evening!
As I continue in my recovery, I am looking forward to many more positive improvements with UCSF!