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You don't have to live with the pain! |
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About Us |
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Meet Our Staff |
Arthur D. Ando, MS, PT, CFMT Clinic Owner, Clinical Director, Clinician, Educator
“My role in educating and training physical therapists has motivated me to set high standards of patient care, and to meet these standards on a patient to patient basis”
Art earned his Master of Science in Physical Therapy from USC in 1982. As part of his training, he completed the Proprioceptive Neuromuscular Facilitation (PNF) training program at the world-renowned Kaiser Rehabilitation facility in Vallejo, CA. After applying his training with neurological patients at Huntington Memorial Hospital in Pasadena, CA for 2 years, he joined his current business associate, Gary Aston PT, with whom he owns a combined physical therapy and Pilates clinic in Anaheim Hills, California.
He successfully underwent the vigorous process of Certification as a Functional Manual Therapist in August of 2002, and continues to lead program development at Ando & Aston P.T. to include that rare balance of skilled soft tissue mobilization, joint mobilization, prescriptive exercise, and functional retraining. Art acted as the primary clinical analyst and also acted as a programmer for the clinical documentation component of a new electronic medical records (EMR) program for physical therapists. The new EMR decision trees, completed in March, 2004 are unique in that they have been written to support the manual therapy model. He continues to edit and revise the 70,000+ lines of code he personally wrote on regular basis.
Art’s second career is in clinical education. It began in 1985 with a teaching and mentoring association with the Institute of Physical Art, Steamboat Springs, CO that continues today. As a senior faculty member, he currently teaches 6 to 10 multi-day post-graduate education courses yearly to other physical therapists on a national basis, primarily in the area of spine rehabilitation, with an emphasis on hands-on manual therapy theory and techniques. He was the Lecturer in Orthopedics at Chapman University Physical Therapy School for four years, and occasionally guest lectures at other physical therapy schools. He also teaches basic anatomy and advanced exercise to fitness professionals.
He spearheaded the rehabilitative use of Feldenkrais, Pilates and Yoga in the Ando & Aston P.T. clinics 1997. He underwent beginning, intermediate and advanced Stott Instructor Certification Training in 2000/01 including mat, reformer, trap table, chair and barrel to better understand the Pilates work, and continues to develop and incorporate these advanced exercise components into rehabilitation, as well as their use in achieving and maintaining wellness. He meets weekly with the trainers as the Clinical Adivisor to the Ando Studio.
His community support activities includes, the medical coverage of the local 5-10K run, regional high school basketball tournaments, ballet performances of the Ballet Pacifica/ABT; and has included professional bull riding, Olympic-level professional beach volleyball events and the 2003 World Gymnastics Championships in Anaheim, California.
Outside of work, his primary love is his wife Elizabeth, as well as his two yellow labs, Murphy & Cooper. He enjoys cooking, landscaping, gardening, hiking, furniture making, and deep-sea fishing. He became Brayden’s grandpop in 2000 and Kylie Elizabeth’s in 2002.
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Gary Aston, BS, PT, CFMT Clinic Owner, Clinical Director, Clinician
“The challenge of solving physical problems, relieving pain and restoring lost function is my motivation for being a physical therapist. When the outcome of treatment is the relief of pain and restored or improved daily functional activities, it brings great satisfaction to me.”
Gary earned his physical therapy degree from U.S.C. in 1976. His first work experience was at St. Jude’s Rehabilitation Hospital as a staff therapist. He was a partner in O.T.A. Physical Therapy, which operated as many as six offices for 13 years. Gary was the Director of Physical Therapy at Martin Luther Hospital for 8 years, and the Director of Physical Therapy at Esperanza Hospital for 2 years.
Gary co-owns Ando & Aston Physical Therapy with Art Ando PT. He actively treats patients as well as manages a growing business. He has continuously supported the education of students and has demonstrated this as a clinical lab instructor Chapman University for 4 years, and as a Clinical Education Instructor to graduate physical therapists for the past 15 years.
Gary feels that the human body is the most complex “machine” on the earth. He believes that understanding the biomechanics of human pain and dysfunction is a lifetime educational process. The best clinician’s that he has met over his twenty-six years of practice have been those unique individuals that have been able to acquire great knowledge in their scientific study of the human body and yet have the hands and creative abilities of a great artist.
Thus, the ability of a clinician to merge “the art and the science” of in the discipline of physical medicine is what Gary considers to be the hallmark of a great clinician. This ability has and continues to be his professional goal. In 2003, Gary became certified as a “Certified Functional Manual Therapist” (CFMT). There are presently less than 100 therapists in the nation with this prestigious certification.
Gary believes that when a patient places himself or herself in a clinician’s care, a great trust has been placed. It is therefore incumbent upon each and every clinician to provide the very best treatment possible. He feels strongly that the physical therapy model is a very effective treatment remedy for neuromusculoskeletal (nerve-muscle-bones-joints) problems.
Gary’s most frustrating experience is to interview/evaluate a patient, and find that they have been experiencing pain and/or dysfunction for many years and have not been properly treated or assessed. They have usually lost the hope of meeting their goals, and have been told to live with their pain and /or dysfunction. As one of the clinicial directors at Ando & Aston, he feels great satisfaction when he is able to discharge those same patients, pain diminished or resolved, function restored and hope for better life restored.
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Elizabeth J. Ando, MBA, CBC, CPMI Chief Operating Officer and Business Consultant
“As a manager, and business consultant, I have tried to bring the concepts of the large corporate community to the small business arena with an emphasis on business metrics and operational process.”
Elizabeth earned her Master of Business Administration at the University of California, Irvine in 1991. Her undergraduate degree is from California State University, Fullerton, in Business Administration with a Marketing and Retail emphasis.
Elizabeth spent more than 20 years working in the finance industry in a variety of areas such as sales, marketing, operations, finance, mortgage loan servicing, client relationship management and training. She has been responsible for clients from the individual physician’s practice to managing worldwide call centers for General Motors and United Parcel Services.
After 20 plus years in commercial banking Elizabeth decided to move to her second career as the owner of a Pilates Studio. She left the known challenges of the corporate world to venture into self-employment. She studied Pilates with both The Physical Mind Institute and Stott Pilates. She opened her studio in Anaheim Hills in May of 1999 with the goal to integrate it into the rehabilitation model within five years. In 2001 she sold the studio to Ando & Aston Physical Therapy and joined that firm as Chief Operating Officer to oversee the daily operations of both the studio and the clinic.
Since 1990 Elizabeth has provided independent consulting work to private practice owners emphasizing the areas of business metrics and operational process. For the past five years she has conducted an independent salary and business measures survey for physical therapy practice owners in the Southern California area.
Elizabeth has lived in the Anaheim Hills area since 1974 and has participated in community activities as the Vice President of Carmen Dragon Chapter of the Orange County Performing Arts Center, and helping manage the medical team support for the annual Mary Castle Fun Run in Anaheim Hills on the 4th of July.
Outside of work Elizabeth enjoys being “Nana” to her grandchildren, Brayden and Kylie with her beloved husband, Art. (also known as “Pop”). She enjoys watching her sons, Jason and Eric grow and build their own families and lives. She has decided to learn to play a musical instrument for the first time in her life and has chosen the guitar. Although not the cook her husband is, she enjoys the time with him in the kitchen and is a respectable galley person. Hiking, travel, and the joy of two Labrador retrievers are leisure time activities.
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