Latitude Physical Therapy of Sag Harbor Expands Its Horizons

It’s not uncommon for specialized gyms, clothing boutiques or even high-end grocery stores to move east from New York City to better serve clients who summer or spend their weekends on the East End.

But 27eastPT in Sag Harbor, has flipped the script by opening a New York City office.

The practice, which has been run by George Wilson and Sinead FitzGibbon since 2017, has taken on a new partner. Bill Collins, formerly of East Hampton, will manage the New York office at 315 Madison Avenue at 42nd Street, just a block away from Grand Central Terminal.

With the new office comes a new name as well: Latitude Physical Therapy.

“Since we expanded to the city, we wanted to rebrand everything,” said Wilson. “Otherwise, with a name like 27east, people might show up at East 27th Street.”

Wilson said they came up with the name because both he and FitzGibbon, a native of Ireland, grew up on the water. “We mark ourselves with latitude and longitude,” he said. The practice’s new logo is a straight line representing latitude with a semicircle above it representing balance.

Opening an office in the city makes sense for the practice, Wilson continued. “We see a lot of people that come in from the city during the summer, and when they are getting ready to head back, they always ask us when they are leaving, ‘Where am I going for PT?’” Wilson said.

In such cases, Wilson said, they would try to find a practice in the city that could serve their clients’ rehabilitation needs. “But they might not be happy,” he added. “This way, they’ll get to use the same machines, so they don’t have to skip a beat with their rehab. It’s great for patient consistency.”

Both Wilson and FitzGibbon will make regular trips into the city to both see patients, confer with doctors, and do basic networking and marketing, FitzGibbon said. Weekend hours will also be available.

The practice enjoys good relations with a number of physicians who refer patients to them, according to FitzGibbon. “There is a confidence that the physicians we have worked with have in us — that they know that we can deal with the complexities of the most challenging patients they have,” she said.

While physical therapy practices are similar in many ways, Latitude focuses on rebuilding clients’ strength after injuries. “Ninety-eight percent of injuries can be taken care of with strengthening — knowing what to do and when to do it based on physiological healing time frames,” said Wilson. “We basically pride ourselves on the functional strength part of it — this is where we shine.”

All the physical therapists on Latitude’s staff are athletes, said Wilson, a surfer and snowboarder, who added that he had played every sport from baseball to soccer. FitzGibbon is an accomplished rower, bicyclist and sailor, and other staff members do everything from play hockey to run marathons.

“You can’t teach someone to do this unless you do it yourself,” Wilson said.

“We are all very physically strong in our out-of work lives, and that really helps to support our practice,” added FitzGibbon, “because we bring that strength and capacity for doing hard things into our practice ourselves on a personal level.”

While they typically deal with patients who have suffered some type of injury, they are seeing more clients who want to improve their physical fitness for specific sports or ward off the effects of aging. “You want to nip those issues in the bud with physical strength training,” said FitzGibbon.