When student athletes get injured, help is just a few steps away.

RUSH Physical Therapy, Pride Athletics’ athletic training partner, operates in the Fitness and Recreation Center in Hammond. 

“We have student athletes who have surgery with our team physicians, and they can get the services they need within walking distance of their dorm,” said Josh James, the RUSH center’s manager. “They may be on crutches, using a scooter or not able to drive or have parents pick them up and take them to physical therapy.”

The center is accessible to all PNW students.James said they can access RUSH center directly, without a doctor’s referral, or by getting a referral from their physician.

The center commonly deals with achilles and knee surgeries, back and hip replacements and spine fusions.

“We see the whole gamut of musculoskeletal injuries,” said James. “We also work closely with our student mental health resources on campus. We use mental health as part of our screening process for evaluation, and if we think a student needs mental health treatment, we work with our fellow providers to provide that collaboration of care.”

The center is popular. 

“It is a busy area because RUSH Physical Therapy has athletes and other patients in the community,” said softball player Myah Stuckey, who is majoring in Integrative Human Health. “They manage it well. They give their full attention to their patients and give them the best treatment that they need.

 “From an athlete’s perspective, we come to the center all the time and we always get better,” she said. “They understand the athletes’ perspectives of injuries.”

Stuckey is a fan of the center for other reasons, too.

“As an intern for RUSH Physical Therapy, I was there almost every day for a couple of hours,” she said. “I got to see everything in the center and grow my medical abilities.”

The RUSH center at the PNW Fitness and Recreation Center on Mondays and Thursdays from 8 a.m. to 7 p.m., Wednesdays from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Tuesdays and Fridays from 7 a.m. to 1 p.m.