Nice to Meet Ya: Meredith Kapchinsky

Meredith Kapchinsky is a pediatric physical therapist. Most are familiar with, or have experienced an issue where physical therapy came into play. After you reach a certain age, you know why you are going through the exercises. The effort is to help get into better shape.

But reasoning with a child’s mind takes lots of talent, patience, creativity and training to get the best out of the child. A lot of play is always involved.

“A lot of it looks like play,” said Meredith Kapchinsky of Fortis Therapy Center. “It’s a game, you get the child to change positions; have the child act like a superhero. You have to be very imaginative to get kids to do things that you want them to do.”

Some children get behind developmentally due to physical limitations or something like Cerebral Palsy, Down's Syndrome or Autism Spectrum. “There’s a timeline for development,” says Meredith. “...Parents get concerned. It might be tightness… the structure of a child and adult are different. The lack of pain is different.”

Fortis Therapy Center is a 501 (c)(3) nonprofit organization. According to their website, “Our goal is to provide Therapy and Fitness services to children and families in need. We hope to raise enough funds to never have to turn a family away from our services.”

When Meredith had her second child she decided she wanted to be involved in “the nonprofit world and help kids.” Her background pointed her in her current direction with her B.S in Biology and Biological Science from Centenary College, Masters from Texas A&M, and her Doctor of Physical Therapy/Physical Therapist from Texas Tech University Health Science Center.

Although having a wealth of knowledge, she’s very personal and has the qualities needed: empathy, a good bedside manner and ability to converse in layman's terms with understanding.

But being a part of the Dripping Springs community, she not only is wife to Kyle Kapchinsky and a baseball mom for her three children, she’s also a personal trainer and gymnastics coach at the Springs Family Y, Preschool Board Chair for Mount Olive Lutheran Preschool, a Physical Therapy Instructor at St. Augustine University, and director/founder of Fortis.

Although during the current situation, she’s mobile, making appointments with clients at their convenience, her future goals are brick and mortar. “I’d love to be in a building,” Meredith said. “But the big picture goal is to hit the entire lifespan, from kids and sports to fitness for adults,” she continued. “My business partner runs the fitness side.”

Her partner, Matt Marchant, a Certified Personal Trainer is specially certified as a Corrective Exercise Specialist. “There has to be something after therapy,” Meredith said. “Fitness can be involved in lifelong therapy.”

Being a nonprofit is a big difference then dealing with insurance companies. “Nonprofits are outside of insurance, insurance companies get to control and deny visits, you can’t do this or that. You’re spending your time documenting rather than actually treating children, ” she said.

Fortis’ cash rates are on a sliding scale and some even pro bono. “Fundraising and grants, to truly treat the child, not every child is the same. They’re all different, what’s best for the child and family are first,” Meredith said.

Fortis will have fundraising events in the future to help with their operations. Getting the word out on their services to donors is helping and a few grants might be possible. To see their services, visit fortistherapycenter. org or their Facebook page at facebook.com/fortistherapycenter.