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the treatment of diseases which are not life-threatening, but still impose strong limitations on lives: such as back-pain. As soon as people are able to afford those services to improve their quality of life, they will do so. Polish society is already at the stage where a high portion of purchasing power is invested in luxury goods. You could regard proper back-treatment as a luxury good within the healthcare market. AJ: Vertebralia is relatively new among Warsaw’s clinics. Who visits you? AK: There is no noticeable trend among our customers; we have people from all different backgrounds, jobs and income brackets. Basically the only thing they share is back pain. We do, however, already have several ex-pat clients, and we’re now starting to receive medical tourists.
Back to Basics
Vertebralia is a place like no other; this isn’t just one more private clinic, rather an oasis where you can breathe and let the experts take charge of your spine and soul. BY AGNIESZKA JĘKSA
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oland’s first clinic fully dedicated to back problems is up and running and offering packages not only unique to this country, but Europe. Head of Marketing and Strategic Development, Alexandra, daughter of Dr. Alexander Kraft (the man who created the first Vertebralia two decades back) speaks to the Insider. Agnieszka Jęksa: Vertebralia originated in Austria. Why did your father decide to open a holistic clinic in the first place, and where does this approach come from? Alexandra Kraft: My father himself suffered from his first disc prolapse when he was 30 years old. Only then did he find that alternatives to a straight-out operation were minimal. From thereon he decided to dedicate his career to finding another way – as such, he didn’t open a holistic center 20 years ago, rather he developed the approach in his
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clinic over that period. Those techniques discovered over time are now being applied in our Polish branch. AJ: Why did you choose Poland to open a branch? AK: My father had been thinking about exporting his Vertebralia methods for quite a long time. Countries in CEE suited the implementation of our approach, as no such services were available and we noticed a lot of opportunities in this particular market. After intensive research we decided to opt for Poland as our pilot project – everything made this country a great fit, from its economic growth to the very structure of the healthcare market.
AJ: What specialist equipment and other packages do you offer? AK: We have highly specialised equipment, such as the Dr. Wolff Back-Check, which allows our physiotherapists to analyse the strength and balance of the patients muscles, in order to assemble a special training plan in our fully equipped Dr. Wolff back-training center. Another high-tech analysis tool that we have in the clinic is the Spineliner, an electronic assistant, which is used by therapists to perform the analysis and treatment of disorders in the musculoskeletal system.
AJ: Why is Vertebralia’s treatment more comfortable and less invasive than in other clinics? AK: Our philosophy is to avoid surgery which in many cases is not needed, but still performed. Our main objective is to first identify the cause of pain, and not just to treat the symptoms. Since back pain can have various causes, an accurate and thorough physical examination and consultation of the patient is essential and is always the first step in our procedure. AJ: Do you think Poland is ready for After a precise analysis of the patient’s such highly-specialized treatments? symptoms we create a therapy program AK: When an economy is developing, the tailor-made for each patient’s needs. By medical market also develops alongside. applying our intergrated therapy concept In the first place, fields which treat lifewe can provide our patients in most cases threatening disease are further developed with quick and successful relief of acute and specialised. As a next step, comes back pain – and a sustainable cure.
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