Liz Miracle, PT, on benefits of virtual pelvic floor physical therapy

Clinician interviews conducted alongside a large retrospective outcomes analysis surfaced recurring advantages for virtual pelvic floor physical therapy care, including improved access, psychological safety, and real-time assessment in the patient's own environment, according to Liz Miracle, PT, MPT, WCS, pelvic floor physical therapist board-certified in pelvic and women's health, and Head of Clinical Quality, Origin.

According to the analysis white paper published by Origin, the cohort comprised 2833 in-person, 1536 hybrid, and 293 virtual patients treated between June 2022 and June 2024. The majority in all 3 settings achieved clinically meaningful improvement (MCID) on the Pelvic Floor Distress Inventory-20 (PFDI-20), and no pairwise between-group comparison reached Bonferroni-corrected significance (required threshold P < 0.0167).

Miracle noted that the clinicians surveyed had experience delivering both in-person and virtual care, allowing direct comparison. According to the analysis, access to care was the most common theme, cited by 13 of 16 surveyed clinicians (81%).

“Access to care was one of those themes,” she said. “I think that's the thing that we think most about when we think about virtual care, which is the ability to get in for an appointment sooner than you would in person, or to see someone if you didn't have someone in your area.”

She pointed to companion data quantifying the barrier. “In another paper that we just published, we found that 40% of Origin patients faced significant barriers to accessing care,” Miracle said, noting cost was the top barrier, followed by time and a lack of nearby options.

Psychological safety emerged as a second theme, with patients exercising more control over the care setting.

“Patients may feel intimidated going to an in-person provider, or like there's some sort of a stigma associated with going into the clinic. So having control over the setting is very meaningful for them,” she said.

Miracle also described a model she characterized as clinician-guided but patient-executed, which may accelerate patient autonomy.

“Virtual providers can't rely on their hands to do the work. You have to do it when you're on the other side of the screen, and that inherently kind of gets you to understand what you're doing faster and helps you to rely on yourself a little bit more quickly,” she said, cautioning that confirming this would require a self-efficacy study.

A further theme was real-time symptom assessment within the patient's environment.

“If someone's telling you when they go to bend down to lift their toddler and you can actually see them bend down and lift their toddler and then they feel that heaviness or that prolapse symptom, you can see exactly what they're doing, and then help talk them through how they would modify that lift,” Miracle said.

Miracle emphasized the value for pregnant and postpartum patients specifically, for whom virtual care removes practical barriers such as travel, childcare, and the physical demands of getting to a clinic during recovery.

For more about virtual pelvic floor physical therapy, watch our previous interview with Miracle, who went into further detail about the data reported. Click here to watch.²

Editor’s note: Liz Miracle reports a relevant disclosure to Origin.

Reference:

1. Link A, Worman R, Kavassalis N, Miracle L. Expanding access, maintaining outcomes: virtual, in-person, and hybrid pelvic health care in a retrospective cohort of 4,662 patients treated at Origin. Origin. 2026. Accessed August 10, 2026. https://www.theoriginway.com/2026-outcomes-white-paper
2. Fitch J. Liz Miracle, PT, MPT, WCS, explains comparable outcomes in virtual pelvic care. Contempoary OB/GYN. Published August 7, 2026. Accessed August 10, 2026. https://www.contemporaryobgyn.net/view/liz-miracle-pt-mpt-wcs-explains-comparable-outcomes-virtual-pelvic-care