Preparing for CSM 2026: Inspiring Growth in Acute Care

Show Notes

As APTA’s Combined Sections Meeting heads to Anaheim, this special episode offers a behind-the-scenes look at how acute care programming comes together — and how clinicians can prepare with purpose. Co-hosts Dr. Leo Arguelles and Dr. Nicole Neveau are joined by James Crick, PT, DPT, PhD, and Jean Woolford, PT, DPT, co-chairs of acute care programming for CSM, to discuss session planning, emerging themes, and practical tips for navigating the conference and making meaningful professional connections.

Today’s Guests:

Enjeen Wolford, PTA

enjeen@gmail.com

James P. Crick, Jr., PT, DPT, PhD

jamescrickdpt@gmail.com

Co-Chairs, CSM Education Programming, APTA Acute Care

Guest Quotes:

5:28 “ Our big goal is to cultivate and bring up the new speakers and the people that have never spoken in a conference before. That’s our big push…”

8:49 “ This is the place to network and to connect. That is the most important and valuable thing that I would give anybody who’s new or newer to attending CSM.”

27:46 “ So comfortable shoes are definite must!”

27:50 “I’ll remember the first time I ever went to CSM I walked in and I couldn’t believe the masses of people that were crossing the street and walking around, and they were all PTs or PTAs, all of them.

They just took over the city. The whole city was taken over and it’s a lot, but it’s so energetic. It’s so much fun and there’s so many great things you can get there.”

Rapid Responses:

If you had to go to work at Disneyland as a Disney character for the day, which character would you pick?

James: “ I’ll go with Aladdin. I actually have one of my first jobs in acute care in Naples, Florida. Shout out Naples Community Hospital. They I had a nurse who said. Did you know that your hair looks like Aladdin? Me? A lot of always will be Aladdin from here on out.”

Enjeen: Goofy

You know you work in acute care when…

Enjeen: “When you have to go look for your nurse on the floor before you see a patient.”

James: “So it’s standing at the bedside first time in a long time and they get to embrace for, physically for the first time in a long time. The therapeutic hug.”

Links:

Acute Care CSM 2026 Programming: https://apta.confex.com/apta/csm2026/meetingapp.cgi/Subject/220

APTA CSM Event App: https://csm.apta.org/programming/csm-events-app

APTA CSM Proposal and Abstract Submissions: https://csm.apta.org/programming/csm-submissions

🎧 Connect with Our Hosts

Leo Arguelles (pronounced LEE-O R-GWELL-IS)

📧 largue2@uic.edu

🐦 Twitter: @LeoArguellesPT

Nicole Neveau, PT, DPT, NCS

📧 ngunder1@gmail.com

🔗 LinkedIn: Nicole Neveau

Danny Young, PT, DPT, PhD