Jump Start Pediatric Therapy Center, LLC opened its doors on 6/1/2009 - 0ver 9 years ago! Jump Start began in a 900 square foot building with three therapy rooms and one therapist. Currently Jump Start has a 2700 square foot facility with seven therapists, six therapy rooms, a sensory gym, and support staff. But how did it all begin?
In 2008, I was working at the local children's hospital. It was a wonderful place to work. There was only one frustration - the wait list. At the time, families would come for an evaluation and then be put on the wait list to start therapy - and the list was long! It was so hard to tell families that they were not going to start therapy right after the evaluation. These families were desperate to get help and wanted to get started right away. I complained about the delay in services to my husband and remarked on the growing North Fort Worth/Keller area. I told him how the problem was only going to get worse as there were no resources available for families living in that area. He recommended that we fix the problem - and Jump Start was born!
In a little over a year, we had Jump Start up and running and by Fall of 2011, my husband joined the team full time to handle all the management and marketing. The name Jump Start was chosen for several reasons. We wanted to provide a "jumpstart", or a boost, to communication skills right away. We wanted to get therapy started in a timely manner with little to no delay after the evaluation. In addition, we wanted to involve families in the therapy session in order to see even faster progress and carryover to more naturalistic environments. We also desired for the name to be catchy to say as well as easy to remember. We have worked hard to uphold these goals as we help children reach their full communication potential.
As Jump Start grew, I was not able to handle the expanding caseload alone. We started adding to our team and currently employ seven speech-language pathologists. At Jump Start, we desire for each child to receive the best therapy possible. To do that, we need to have the best therapists. We pride ourselves on handpicking therapists that are experts in their field, therapists that are passionate about children and knowledgeable about communication and feeding disorders, and therapists that are driven to make a difference. Together we have been able to change the lives of thousands of children in the North Fort Worth/Keller area as we strive to be the top pediatric speech therapy clinic in North Tarrant County.
Lauren Roe, MS, CCC/SLP
Jump Start Pediatric Therapy Center, LLC