A physician here who specializes in diagnosing and treating spinal conditions plans to start a new practice, called SpineTeamSpokane, and to open multidisciplinary spine centers in Spokane Valley and on the North Side.


The physician, Dr. Daniel Dibble, says he has leased 4,300 square feet of space in the year-old North Evergreen Office Building, at 1117 N. Evergreen, for one of the spine centers. He plans to move his current practice, the Pain Diagnostic & Treatment Center, there from a 1,000-square-foot space in the St. Lukes Medical Building, at 715 S. Cowley, at the end of this month and to drop that name and expand his services.


Dibble also operates a Coeur dAlene office, under the name Pain Management Clinic of Coeur dAlene, which he says will change its name shortly to SpineTeamSpokane. He says hes looking for a North Side space suitable to house the spine center there and expects to open that facility later this year. His offices currently employ a total of seven people, and he says, We expect to double that.


His overall intent, he says, is to create one-stop, multidisciplinary centers for the nonsurgical treatment of back and neck problems. Many people who suffer from such ailments dont know where to go or what to do because services for those types of problems tend to be fragmented, Dibble asserts.


The Texas Back Institute, based in Plano, Texas, was the first in the country to embrace such a multidisciplinary approach, and Dibble says that SpineTeamSpokane will be the first practice in Washington state, to his knowledge, to adopt that model.


At the Valley location, Were going to have an in-house physical therapy department, which will take up about a quarter of the space, with all the latest and greatest equipment.


A big part of our practice is physical therapy, he says.


The practice will use a Web site, at www.spineteamspokane.com, to provide information to primary-care doctors and the public about back and neck problems, he says.


The practices Web site includes an anatomy library, exercise library, and sections on conditions, symptoms, and treatments.


Dibble is board-certified in pain medicine and anesthesiology, and, according to the Web site, is skilled in treating patients with occupational injuries, degenerative diseases, and musculoskeletal conditions.


In addition to his own practice, he serves as medical director of the St. Lukes Rehabilitation Institute pain rehabilitation program.


T.W. Clark Construction LLC, of Spokane, occupies the rest of the 10,500-square-foot main floor of the single-story building on Evergreen where the SpineTeamSpokane center will open.


The building also has a 4,500-square-foot daylight basement. T.W. Clark owners Tom Clark and Clayton Linnell own the building, which T.W. Clark erected.


Contact Kim Crompton at (509) 344-1263 or via e-mail at kimc@spokanejournal.com.