50 Innovative Companies to Watch 2021
The Silicon Review
Pain is one of the most persistent symptoms in medicine, and various reports suggest that pain affects over 100 million Americans. Our nervous system is very complex, and it has built-in alert triggers that will indicate damage or upcoming damage to our tissues. This alert is called pain, and it can be classified into two categories—acute and chronic. Acute pain is time-limited, and it is linked to tissue injuries like cuts, tooth infections, bone fractures, and surgeries. Most of the time, acute pain will get resolved with healing. Sometimes this pain will continue to exist even after healing, and it will not have a trigger warning. This is called chronic pain. Conventional methods of pain treatment will focus on just the physical part of pain using procedures and medication. This is, however, not sufficient, and patients will have to use prescription opioids to keep the pain under control.
There are various providers delivering excellent pain management services globally, but Airrosti stands out from the rest. Airrosti providers are singularly focused on getting results for their patients while providing the highest level of quality care. Whether you’ve been living with chronic and nagging pain for years or if you’ve recently experienced an acute injury, Airrosti’s providers will help you find the root of your pain to provide efficient, effective, and lasting relief in the vast majority of cases.
Below is an interview conducted with Kelly Green and Dr. Jason Garrett of Airrosti. Green is the co-founder and board chair of Airrosti and provides the perspective of Airrosti as a business. Dr. Garrett is the Chief Medical Officer for Airrosti and will provide clinical views.
Q. What was the idea behind starting Airrosti?
KG: I became aware of the treatment model a long, long time ago. My son suffered an injury playing basketball, and a friend recommended this treatment option to us. The doctor who performed it was an hour and a half away, and it was expensive, but the treatment worked so well that it not only fixed my son’s hamstring injury, but it fixed his migraines that he had been having for years, that even specialists couldn’t eliminate. I was blown away at how well it worked. Years later, my business partner and I were having lunch, and he told me about a business opportunity with a healthcare company. He started describing the manual therapy, and I knew exactly what he was talking about. We were quite struck by the opportunity to really make a difference, and to positively impact the lives of patients. This became our mission.
Q. How do your services address the problem of persistent pain? How successful has Airrosti been when it comes to treating chronic pain?
JG: Most people don’t understand why they are in pain and don’t handle it correctly. At Airrosti, we do a thorough investigation into the pain; we identify what is causing it, and then manually fix it, or teach the patient how to fix it. If you can get a normal range of motion back and then put some good functional stress on it, through really targeted, simple rehab, then pain goes away, function improves, and overall general life happiness improves dramatically.
KG: Our results speak for themselves when it comes to success. Out of over 1,000,000 injuries treated, our patients have reported 88.3% complete injury resolution at the completion of their Airrosti treatment plan, and injuries were resolved in an average of 3.2 visits.
Q. Tell us about your Remote Recovery service.
JG: From a clinical standpoint, our telehealth service is very similar to our in-clinic treatments. We do a very thorough interview, where the doctor is interacting with the patient in complete HIPAA compliance. During that time, we use our own orthopedic range of motion and functional testing that the patient can do in front of us to give us real feedback on where their injuries are coming from. Then we identify if this person is a good candidate, which most of the time they are. We then show the patient some stretches and some exercises. The patient will then receive a kit with tools that we educate the patient on during the follow-up visit. We have also created all our own videos of the different exercises, and it’s as if you have your own personal coach there with you. They’re talking directly to you and showing you how to do these exercises that get you out of pain. If the patient is consistently doing the exercises, they’re going to feel way better.
KG: Our whole model is based on the in-clinic model, and we have a 99.4% patient satisfaction rating. It has allowed us to speed up our process of becoming a nation-wide provider by being available in 43 states.
Q. What are you doing to ensure you continue to grow and develop as a leader?
KG: I try hard to keep track of things that work and things that don’t work. If we aren’t making mistakes, we aren’t trying to do anything that matters. It is ok to make mistakes; you take responsibility, and you learn from it and move on, and you get better. My employees aren’t scared of me, and I argue for things that matter, but no one is afraid to say no. You eventually have to make a decision, and if it’s not the best, we encourage people to own up, learn from it and create growth.
JG: My goal is to help the people that I directly support utilize their strengths to give them more opportunities, and then find ways for those opportunities to benefit our company. My job is to find opportunities for other people.
Q. What can we expect from Airrosti in the near future?
KG: We are in-clinic in four states, but we are looking at 43, going on 48 states, where you don’t have to travel to an office with Airrosti Remote Recovery. This has helped us go from a regional to a national company and allowed us to expand our clinics, increase the number of doctors that we have and put convenience into healthcare.
Meet the leaders behind the success of Airrosti
Kelly Green is the co-founder and Board Chairman of Airrosti. He joined Airrosti as its CEO in March 2006. Seeing that the current healthcare system is hungry for “results based” treatment options, Green is focused on further strengthening the unique culture at Airrosti that is committed to positively impacting the lives of their patients. They focus on attracting and supporting doctors who have a genuine passion for helping others as part of their core DNA. Green became Airrosti’s Chairman of the Board in September 2018.
Dr. Jason Garrett is Airrosti’s Vice President of Clinical Development. Since starting with Airrosti in 2005, Dr. Garrett developed multiple practices in Houston and San Antonio. In his current role, he trains new providers, evaluates current field providers, aids in business development and marketing, and educates physicians - Sports Medicine, Surgeons, Family Medicine, etc. - about Airrosti.