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July 10, 2025 13 mins

The APTA Nebraska podcast provides critical updates on recent healthcare legislation and upcoming events for physical therapists throughout the state. This legislation brings a 2.5% Medicare fee increase for 2026 while highlighting concerns about rural hospital closures and changes to student loan programs.

• Recent "Big Beautiful Bill" signed with 2.5% Medicare fee schedule increase for 2026
• Concerns about Medicaid cuts potentially impacting rural Nebraska hospitals
• New $100,000 cap on grad plus loans affecting PT student financing
• EPSIG Social at Sunny's on September 17th from 7-9pm
• Nebraska PTs participating in Husker Harvest Days Health Exhibit (Sept 9-11)
• "Baseball-a-ween" trunk-or-treat event at Werner Park on October 24
• Jingle Bell Run returning December 6th
• APTA advocacy app available for easy communication with representatives

Download the APTA Advocacy app to stay informed and communicate with your representatives. It's the easiest way to engage in advocacy and make your voice heard.

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Episode Transcript

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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to the APTA Nebraska podcast, where we dive
into the stories, challenges andinnovations shaping physical
therapy in our state.
We're here to advance, promoteand protect the practice of
physical therapy, optimizing thehealth and quality of life for
all Nebraskans.
Join us as we connect withexperts, share insights and

(00:22):
build communities throughout ourprofession.
With experts, share insightsand build communities throughout
our profession.
All right, welcome back to theAPTA Nebraska podcast.
I'm Brad Dexter.

Speaker 2 (00:31):
I'm joined by Nick Weber today.
Hi, Nick.
Hey, great to be back.

Speaker 1 (00:33):
Yeah, good to have you back.
Hey, we want to give a fewupdates to our membership today.
One of those is you know, therewas a bill that was just signed
here in the last week, right?
So I'd love to hear how that'smaybe impacting practice and
maybe what's continuing tohappen at an advocacy level.

(00:54):
And then we have a number ofevents that are coming up too.
So, nick, I know you want totalk about some of those events,
and so that's kind of our.
Those are our chapter titlesfor today, and I guess I'll let
you just jump in with that firstone.
So the big beautiful bill wassigned within the last week here
.
Why don't you go ahead and tellus how that's impacting our

(01:15):
profession?

Speaker 2 (01:17):
Yeah, you know, in a sense it's nice to be able to
take a breath for a minute nowthat it's done.
A lot of advocacy attempts wentinto this.
There's a lot of collaborationsamongst all kinds of health
professionals across Nebraskaand at the national level, of
course as well, so there's a fewbig updates.
From a healthcare standpoint, Ithink there were a lot of

(01:38):
concerns with this bill.
Now we just kind of wait on theback end to see what comes to
fruition.
One kind of positive thing justright off the top we did get a
2.5% increase to the Medicarefee schedule, to the conversion
factor for 2026, which we'reexcited about.
Unfortunately, they didn'tinclude that same increase we

(02:05):
were asking for for the 2025fiscal year, so we'll just have
to wait for that one a littlebit, and so at least the 2026
increase gets us back to theprevious rate from the cut that
we had in 2025.
So excited to see that.
Tentatively, there was a timefrom the House bill where we
also had an inflationaryincrease, an annual increase,
that was included within thebill, which is something that

(02:26):
health associations have beentrying to advocate for for a
long time, and that passed withthe House version.
Unfortunately, it came out ofthe Senate version, so advocacy
continues on that front.
And then you know, I think, likeI said, we're just kind of we
got to kind of wait and see howthings play out.
There's there was a lot of talkabout cuts to Medicaid and

(02:47):
people losing their access tothe Medicaid system.
We know that's going to havesome impact here in Nebraska and
now we just need to kind ofwatch and see how that all plays
out.
If you look at some of thereports from state senators,
they're very aware that thiscould have a big impact on our
rural hospitals.
There is a fund out there totry to soften that blow and that

(03:10):
would require the state toapply for some of those funds,
and so we hope to see ourcongressional leaders and our
governor work together with ourhospital system and just really
try to make sure that they getthe funds necessary to keep our
hospitals open, though I knowthe Nebraska hospital
association is worried that thisparticular bill might cause,
you know, a dozen hospitals toclose.

(03:31):
And so you know we're going tocontinue to try to support our
hospital systems here inNebraska and just kind of see
how that all plays out.
But we really hope not to loseany more hospital systems.
I know we just lost one in thelast week.
So one of our rural settings,so hope for just good things on
that front.
The other part of the bill thatwas the kind of concerning was

(03:53):
on the student loan side ofthings.
There are new regulations inplace that make it a little more
restrictive as far as firstattaining loans, now grad loans.
The grad plus program is limitedto $100,000.
So anything above that studentswill have to go out and find
private loans, which of coursecan just you know they can still

(04:14):
attain.
They'll need a cosigner, you'llneed good credit scores to get
those things.
They might come with a variablerate and then just a little bit
more risk for both them and thecosigner.
So we will try to help them.
You know, myself and Brad, you,I know, at the different
schools throughout Nebraska hereyou know, trying to make sure

(04:35):
our applicants to stay strong,and so we want to make sure that
we're helping those individualsfind the loans that they need
to get through our programs.
And so you know I think it'sgoing to put a little more work
on the programs to do that helptheir students find resources to
find loans that are if theyneed them, and just see how that
potentially has an effect onthe kind of long term picture

(04:58):
potentially in our workforce andmaking sure we're not losing
applicants to other professions,especially those that want to
be in PT.

Speaker 1 (05:05):
Yeah, Thanks for the updates.
Obviously, anytime newlegislation is signed like that,
you know we're always kind ofwatching and trying to figure
out what's the fallout, what arethe upsides, what's the fallout
from something like that too?
And so you know we're prettygood at changing within our
profession and being nimble.
We've got to continue doingthat.

(05:27):
As we move forward, too, Newproblems arise and we've got to
figure out new solutions.

Speaker 2 (05:34):
That's right.
Like you said, that's notsomething new to us.
We're used to adjusting on thefly and making the best of what
it is.

Speaker 1 (05:41):
Yeah, hey.
So the other thing I mentionedis, you know a lot of events are
coming up, both to kind ofround out this summer, but also
throughout the fall.
Here too, why don't you startus off with the EPSIG social
that's coming up?

Speaker 2 (05:58):
Yeah, yeah.
Excited to bring attention tothis, our APTA Nebraska Early
Professional Special InterestGroup is hosting an event at
Sunny's on September 17th.
They're calling this theirSummer Social.
It's an opportunity for earlyprofessionals just to connect
with other early professionalsas well as network with some
mentors, if they're looking formentorship, with some mentors,

(06:18):
if they're looking formentorship, some of our mentors
that volunteer for us here inNebraska will be there, and so
just a nice opportunity.
I think it's from 7 to 9 on the17th at Sonny's in Omaha.
And so we hope to see a lot ofpeople there for that Good and

(06:40):
then in September we have acontingent that will be at
Husker Harvest Days, right, yeah, new thing for us Our new
Central District chairsidentified an opportunity to
participate in the Health andWellness Exhibit Fair at Husker
Harvest Days, september 9ththrough the 11th.
We hear that something like90,000 individuals come through
that particular event.
So a great opportunity for usto promote the physical therapy

(07:01):
profession and just wellness ingeneral.
And we're going to be kind ofpartnering with the Nebraska
AgrAbility group with a boothand just some kind of fun
giveaways and things at ourbooth.
So we encourage people to comeby as well as we're looking for
people to help us just kind ofwork the table over the course
of three days.
So for any clinicians out therethat maybe are kind of in that

(07:23):
area and want to help us out, weare also happy to kind of
welcome them to set out anymaterials they might have,
resources about their particularcompany.
If they want to share that atthe table, we're happy to
include that kind of along withall our other information that
we'll have.

Speaker 1 (07:37):
Good, and then in October I know there's a
Halloween opportunity.
Nick, are you dressing up forthat one?

Speaker 2 (07:46):
Absolutely.
You know, if you've ever cometo Jingle Bell Run before too,
you know I'm not afraid to getinto costumes for some of our
events.
So yeah, we're going toparticipate in Baseball-a-ween
this year at Werner Park onOctober 24th and for those that
aren't familiar, it's like ahuge trunk or treat event for
kids.
Something like 5,000 kids comethrough the event.
A lot of companies set upactivity stations kind of all

(08:11):
around Werner Park and insidethe event and then outside as
well.
So we're going to have a booth,we're going to hand out a lot
of candy, we'll be dressed up,we'll have a theme.
We're kind of discussing rightnow maybe some different
activities for our booth.
I know kind of pumpkin bowlinghas risen to the top of that
particular opportunity, so we'llcome up with something.

(08:32):
It'll be a fun event.
Hope families will come out.
And again, if anybody wants tohelp us work the work the table,
we'd love to have you there andhelp us hand out candy the work
, the table.

Speaker 1 (08:42):
We'd love to have you there and help us hand out
candy.
That's great.
And then kind of rounding outthe the fall activities.
Uh, you've got the jingle bellrun in december, correct?

Speaker 2 (08:49):
yeah, that's uh, saturday, december 6th.
Um, this is our fourth yeardoing this.
Um, grace not and myself willbe co-chairing the event with
the nebraskaritis Foundation.
And another just fun event andopportunity to come out, get a
nice walker short 5k, run inbefore it gets too cold and
again, that's a.
It's a fun kind of dress upevent.

(09:10):
We love to see people in theirSanta elf costumes.
All the different things comeout.
We got good weather last year.
We're hoping for the same thisyear.
So, yeah, I hope you guys allcome out and if you sign up in
July, we'll give you $5 offregistration and we'll have an
APT Nebraska team that you canfind on the website.

Speaker 1 (09:29):
That's great.
Well, thanks, hey.
You know, for any of ourmembers that are listening to
this, if you guys want to getengaged, we will have links at
the bottom of the podcast foryou to be able to link easily to
any of those events so you cansee them.
Epsig social, too.

(09:55):
It's a great way just toconnect with your peers and with
mentors within our organizationtoo.
Great way to network throughoutour state and just get to know
some more PTs there as well.
And you know I wouldn't bedoing my membership chair duties
if I didn't share some kind ofa membership benefit.
Right now, and since that JingleBell run is you know what, five

(10:15):
, six months off or away at thispoint, there are a couple
membership benefits through theAPTA that could help get you
ready for something like that,should you want to go out and
run.
So, first and foremost, there'skind of a network called Active
and Fit Direct, which can giveyou access to over 13,000 gyms

(10:37):
and thousands of on-demandworkouts for a really low price.
So pretty ideal for busyschedules that many of us are
engaged in.
And then there are alwaysdiscounts on different types of
shoes through the APTA as wellNew Balance, Saucony and more.
So make sure that you go checkout your membership benefits on

(10:59):
the APTA website and don'tforget that you can get those
discounts on the training andthe shoes as well, Nick, I think
the last thing I wanted tobring up was you know, we have
our delegates for our chapter ofthe APTA in Nebraska here
heading out to House ofDelegates within the next week

(11:20):
and, just for you listeners, wewill be having updates from that
.
We will not be live updatingthat at all, but we will provide
updates in August on anotherpodcast, if you're interested in
learning more about what wasbeing accomplished at House of
Delegates this year.
I think that's all I have, Nick.
Anything else you want to add?

Speaker 2 (11:40):
Yeah, just like you said, looking forward to the
House Should be a really fun fewdays going out to do my
components, meeting with otherpresidents across the country,
and then the two days for theHouse, as well as Capitol Hill
Day tacked on the end.
So we'll have an opportunity tomeet with our five
congressional leaders as well,and we have a nice group of

(12:03):
clinicians that are coming outto do that, those meetings.
So hopefully we'll get somemore information from them
regarding this one big beautifulbill as well.
So we should have a lot ofinformation to report back here
into July and into early August.

Speaker 1 (12:15):
Good.
Well, thanks for all thatyou're doing.
I know there's it's not justyou, it's a number of other
people and advocacy is notalways a fast thing, right, it's
slow, it's plodding, like someof us might run the jingle bell
run.
It can be more of a pl plotthan a sprint, right, and
sometimes it doesn't feel likemuch is getting done, and other

(12:37):
times it feels like things aremoving really fast, and so I
know we've got to just keep atit.
In a lot of ways, we've got tocontinue building relationships,
building networks of people,and we need members like those
of you listening to be a part ofthat as well.
Make your voice heard.
If you haven't been aware of it,there is an app for the APTA to

(13:00):
easily advocate.
It's the APTA Advocacy app.
I would encourage any of youthat are listening to download
that.
It's probably the easiest wayto engage in advocacy.
You can easily send letters toyour representatives through
that app and be kept up to dateas to what's going on as well.
So thanks again for all of youthat are listening and hope this

(13:22):
is an easy way to kind of stayup to date with what we have
going on in our organization,within our profession and much
more of this will also be comingout in an email form and will
be accessible on our website aswell.
So until next time, hope youall do well.
Thanks for tuning in to theAPTA Nebraska podcast.
Stay connected with us for moreconversations that elevate our

(13:45):
profession and improve the livesof Nebraskans.
Don't forget to subscribe,share and join the discussion,
because together we're drivingthe future of physical therapy
forward.
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