Hi Kristina, please kick things off for us with an introduction to yourself and your story.
For as long as I can remember, I’ve wanted to be in a “helping” profession and I wanted to work with children. At first, I thought maybe I’d be a teacher, then a pediatrician. Having received speech therapy as a young child, speech pathology was a field I was vaguely familiar with (although I knew nothing of the vast scope of practice and specialty areas involved). I ended up choosing my college, Loyola University in Maryland because I knew they had a strong speech pathology program. Each class I took further confirmed that this was what I wanted to do with my life. I particularly enjoyed the medically-based classes, so after college, I sought a medical speech pathology program to get my Masters and ended up at Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston, SC. It was there that I completed a clinical rotation in the NICU in the pediatric hospital, learned about feeding therapy, and found my true passion. After graduate school, I was fortunate to get my first job at Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital (JHACH) and continued to further my knowledge and hone my skills in the evaluation and treatment of feeding and swallowing disorders.
My first year, I was completing numerous pediatric swallow studies each week and helping run the intensive feeding program there. I spent the better part of a decade at JHACH, providing speech-language and feeding evaluation and treatment, and eventually becoming a Certified Lactation Counselor as well. Being so closely involved with children and their families over the course of those years, and seeing the difference I could make in their collective lives, was (and is) such a blessing. To sit with a parent while they get to see their child take a bite of something for the first time ever after having been tube-fed for their entire lives is an indescribable feeling and I will never take it for granted. Starting my own practice was something I considered for many years. I really wanted to get out into the community, help generalize those skills children were learning in my office into their homes, into restaurants, at parks, at birthday parties! I wanted to solely focus on providing the highest quality of care possible and developing very close relationships with the families I served. In February 2018, I resigned from my position at the hospital and dove headfirst into my private practice, Madden Therapy Solutions. Fortunately, I received a very positive response from the community and my practice’s excellent reputation spread relatively quickly. Patients and families were so appreciative of the quality of treatment being provided and the elevated level of personal service and individualized care they received.
Because of the support of the community in Tampa Bay, the practice continued to grow. I continued to hire the most talented therapists I could find (all trained extensively by me and one therapist who actually trained me over a decade ago!) so that I could guarantee families the same exemplary quality of care across the board. Feeding therapy is something not many speech pathologists are trained in or provide, and even fewer provide it well. That top-notch quality we provide not only in feeding therapy but across all our services is what, I believe, sets us apart. At its inception, Madden Therapy Solutions offered pediatric speech-language and feeding therapy and lactation counseling services. We have now grown our services to include pediatric and maternal nutrition and pediatric sleep consulting and serve most areas across Tampa Bay. I could not be prouder of the team I have so carefully curated. I was never interested in becoming a therapy “factory.” Of course, my goal is to continue to grow my practice, potentially continue to expand the services we offer, but to never lessen the standard of care- and caring- we provide to our families. I hold myself and my therapists to the highest standard, and no matter how much Madden Therapy grows, I will never let that standard fall.
I’m sure you wouldn’t say it’s been obstacle free, but so far would you say the journey have been a fairly smooth road?
I don’t know that owning your own business is ever a smooth road! I had to learn the business side of private practice very quickly, not to mention marketing, networking, search engine optimization….the list goes on and on. Finding the balance between when to hire the next therapist and how quickly I’ll be able to fill their caseload, and navigating the timing of how long it will take them to train vs. not keeping children on a long waitlist, is difficult to say the least. I feel a lot of (self-imposed) pressure to make sure I am meeting the needs of both our patients and my employees. That being said, I’ve still enjoyed the process and love being my own boss. I would say the biggest challenge we’ve faced thus far has been COVID-19 on several fronts. Our patient census definitely went down and I was worried about my therapists because they didn’t have as many children on their caseloads. Many parents lost their jobs and so couldn’t afford to continue therapy.
Additionally, while we were able to successfully transition to teletherapy for many of our patients, there were several families for whom that was not an option. Some parents understandably didn’t want their children to have any more “screen time” than necessary because their children were already receiving all their schooling virtually, but also didn’t want to risk any outside interaction. Some children needed continued and consistent face-to-face care, so we had to work with families to determine how to provide that care, in-person, as safely as possible. It’s something we continue to navigate to this day, as information is ever-evolving.
Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know?
Madden Therapy Solutions provides evaluation and treatment of pediatric speech-language and feeding disorders, lactation counseling services, pediatric and maternal nutrition services, and pediatric sleep consulting. We serve most of Tampa Bay and offer therapy in-home, in schools/daycares, and in-office (in St Petersburg). We are a team of speech pathologists, lactation counselors, and dietitians and are most known for our specialization and excellence in feeding therapy, as many practices do not specialize and/or do not offer that service. I believe what sets us apart from others is the consistent, outstanding care provided by every one of our therapists. I am extremely selective in my hiring and training of new staff. This will never be a factory of ever-changing therapists. I never want families to feel that they are on a conveyor belt just moving child after child in and out the door.
All of us at Madden Therapy Solutions are hyperfocused on personalized care, personal relationships with families, and delivering outstanding results. That is what I am most proud of in terms of our “brand” – every single one of us is committed to the quality of therapy we’re providing and genuinely care about each and every patient and family. Families can sense that. I believe that’s why we have grown and been as successful as we have; families don’t get the standard 9-5 office experience. They have our cell phones, they text us photos and videos of big “wins” at home…..and we answer! We genuinely care and want them to know we are their teammates.
Before we let you go, we’ve got to ask if you have any advice for those who are just starting out?
My advice would be that owning your own business is very hard work, so be prepared for that. I did not understand the hours my business would require of me or how many details I’d need to keep track of. I wish I would have taken a business class before venturing out on my own so the learning curve wasn’t so steep. It’s definitely not the easy route, it’s not 9-5. The work never stops as a business owner. On the other hand, It’s also very rewarding and amazing to be able to look back at the end of the day and see what you’ve created. To be able to be proud of what you’ve built on your own is incredible…and for me personally, to be able to help people and change the lives of children and their families at the same time is the icing on the cake. Also…take a vacation! Turn your phone off, put your computer away. It’s vitally important for your mental health to really “check out” every now and then (I need to take my own advice)!
Contact Info:
- Address: 1507 4th St N St Petersburg, FL 33704
- Email: kristina@maddentherapysolutions.com
- Website: www.maddentherapysolutions.com
- Instagram: @madden_therapy_solutions
- Facebook: www.facebook.com/maddentherapysolutions
