NRRTS updates website

LUBBOCK, Texas - NRRTS has a new mobile-friendly website that's easier to navigate and, well, plain easier on the eyes, says Executive Director Weesie Walker.

“The old website was not very inviting,” she said of www.nrrts.org. “The new website has a much warmer feel.”

Walker likens NRRTS's old website, which was about 10 years old, to a car with 500,000 miles. It was time to trade it in for a new one, with help from Lafayette, La.-based Wide Web Marketing.

Front and center on the new website: a picture of a NRRTS registrant with a young boy in a wheelchair, and the tagline: “Providing the Human Touch.” Below the picture is a description of RRTSs and CRTSs as professionals who comply with the NRRTS Standard of Practice and Code of Ethics.

“We wanted what that person represents right there on the homepage,” Walker said.

During the process of revamping the website, Walker realized just how much information it contained but that she didn't even know was there. A Resources tab, for example, now includes a list of dozens of case studies, everything from “Tilt & Recline: Understanding All the Angles” to “It Takes a Village to Get a Chair.”

“They're case studies that have been printed in Directions (the official magazine of NRRTS) in one place,” she said. “They can be used for documentation or as a reference, or for showing someone what complex rehab is all about.”

Another major feature of the new website: a Registrants tab that allows online renewals.

“People are so pressed for time, being able to access things wherever and whenever they have a minute is so important,” said Michael Barner, who runs the seating and mobility clinic at Michigan Medicine and who is past president of NRRTS. “For me, being able to renew online was key. Having to print a document, fill it out and fax it in—how long ago were we doing that?”

Additionally, the new website's Resources tab includes links to complex rehab-related events, organizations, manufacturers and more, a tool that especially comes in handy for those new to the market, Walker says.

“You have NRRTS and the CRTS, and RESNA and the ATP, and NCART—all of these different groups and different acronyms,” Walker said. “I once sat down with someone who had just come into the industry and at the end of conversation he asked me if I could write down all this information and send it to him. This helps to show how we're all intertwined.”