Do you Judge PCPs by their referral rate? To me that’s a sign of a good PCP, shows a willingness to collaborate and get a patient the help they need from the correct specialist. Collaboration is a good thing in medicine.

A 10% referral rate does mean the took care of the problem 90% of the time. Absent of outcomes that’s a huge stretch (like you said). Typically the same types patients are coming in to see Sports Med Physicians as orthopedic surgeons. There’s no way Surgeons are only doing surgery on only 10% of patients that walk through their doors. So these sports med Physicians were “fixing” 90% of the patients without surgery or therapy? If that’s the case they’re more effective than any Orthopedic Surgeon out there. Were PT referrals from Sports Med Tracked, how many of the those 2 visits were actually 2 visits with the sports med physician with 8 visits of PT in between.

Also visits aren’t really comparable between PTs and Physicians. Apples and Oranges. PTs guide you through a program to improve Strength and Mobility as well as Progress you back to full functional activity. That doesn’t happen overnight, it takes 6-8 weeks for true strength Changes changes to occur, and PTs help progress and modify in that time frame. Multiple studies have demonstrated a significant decrease in cost of care (much more important than number of visits) by seeing a PT first and that the quicker you get in to PT the better the outcome (In terms of decreased disability).

I’m in no way trying to say that people should not see Orthopedic Surgeons or Sports Med Physicians, not at all. But for injuries that Likely aren’t serious, absent a serious MOI, like the OP people shouldn’t hesitate to get in to see a PT to help with the problem and help prevent future injuries.