Get to know Etobicoke physiotherapy clinic manager Amanda Raguseo. I am on a mission to spotlight our clinicians in 1-on-1 interviews that aim to help you get to know them a bit more on a personal level. In these candid discussions, we talk childhood injuries, childhood dreams, education, career paths, parenthood, and even some fun rapid-fire style questions.
At Propel Physiotherapy, we strive to build meaningful connections with all of our clients. One of the parts of this job that many of us find the most rewarding is seeing that connection open people up to reaching for their goals and achieving them.
Whether your time with us is just a couple of sessions or a lifelong journey, we want to get to know you by being fully present in every interaction and listening actively. We also know that it is equally important for you to get to know us so that you can trust us to provide the highest quality of care.
Before you come for your first session with one of our therapists, we hope that you have checked out our bios on the company website, read a few reviews online, or that you have been referred by a trusted friend or health professional. You can also see what we are up to in and out of the clinic on our socials regularly. Plus, we are always looking for new ways to engage and interact with you.
I’m so excited for you to listen to check out this episode, where I chatted with Amanda Raguseo — registered physiotherapist and our Etobicoke clinic manager. What’s great about Amanda is that in addition to having extensive experience working with people with neurological injuries in clinic, she also works on the field with teams in various sports. She has broadened her skillset and has been able to translate key learnings across both settings.
In this interview, Amanda answered a few of my questions about her education and career and also shared some nuggets of wisdom, like:
- How she developed her love of sport.
- Her learning style and how her education translates into her everyday practice.
- What surprised her most about working in neurological physiotherapy?
- What enjoys most about working with sports teams.
- What skills or lessons she has been able to translate from the field to the clinic.
- Her best advice for people starting out in the physiotherapy profession.
- Her best advice for clients with chronic conditions.
- Her best advice for anyone struggling to meet their daily physical activity requirements.
Plus, Amanda closed out the interview by indulging me on a rapid-fire question round that gave us a chance to get to know her in a more personal and fun light.
Here’s a glance at this episode…
- [1:25] Growing up in an Italian household, sports, specifically soccer was very much a part of my life…
- [3:55] I really enjoyed sort of what they call the problem-based learning aspect at McMaster was very much, there is a problem you have to solve and you need to be the one that goes to find the resources to solve that problem. And I find that translates over to physiotherapy as a practice very well.
- [8:49] And I was also very surprised at how quickly we can see results in a neurological setting. Yes, there are some cases where things take a lot longer, but then there are also some instantaneous cause and effect that happen in clinic before our eyes, before our clients’ eyes, and they’re like, “Wow, I didn’t know I was capable of that.” And I’m just as shocked, but as happy as they are, when they achieve those goals. It almost seems like magic sometimes.
- [11:45] What I really enjoy about the sport side of things is the on-field aspect to it…They’re live, you have to make decisions very quickly, you have to make a split decision, you have to be ready to go the entire time. I just like kind of the thrill, the excitement of that.
- [13:52] Sometimes I can better detect now somebody who’s sort of overdoing exercises or sort of overdoing things and just trying to sort of bring them back down to more of a baseline to prevent repetitive injuries or things that of that nature as well.
- [15:42 ] Just be patient with yourself. Yeah, you have all this knowledge as a new physiotherapist coming out of school, it’s in there, you just have to tap into it and utilize it. The basics are the basics for a reason. And they can go miles. You will do more with the basics, then you will do with the fancier courses and the certifications that you get afterwards.
- [19:10] I just make sure that I just let people know, the reason that we’re doing certain things is to reach your end goal. And I often use the term, it sounds silly but I say the word, yet. So if someone says, “Oh, I can’t go from sitting to standing on my own,” and I say you can’t go from sitting to standing on your own yet. There’s going to be a time or there’s sort of a goal of getting to that point. And these are the steps, the little steps that we have to take to get to that goal.
- [20:58] I just think of it this way. If there is a tire that’s rolling, it’s easy for you to just kind of push it along. If a tire is stopped in order to get that moving, or a boulder even, you got to push it a lot harder. So, if you just don’t stop moving, it’s easier to keep moving.
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