Importance of Compliance
Most chiropractors are owners of their practice, therefore, offices operate at the owner’s discretion within federal and state scopes. Many chiropractic offices have various philosophies and perspectives on how to interact with patients and how to reach health goals. These differences will be seen in technique, office protocols, and treatment plan recommendations.
Goals of Treatment Plans
The focus of this post is on treatment plans. Goals of a treatment plan can be separated into short term goals and long term goals. In general, short term goals often include decreasing intensity and frequency of discomfort, increasing pain free ranges of motion, and decreasing positive exam findings. Long term goals focus on increased functional mobility and how to decrease the likelihood of reoccurrence or new injury onset. Re-evaluates and patient feedback are documented to see if these goals are being reached.
The stage of the condition; and if it is defined as acute (new, recent, actively painful) or chronic (old, reoccurring, latent periods) will also influence treatment plan formats. An acute condition is actively in the stages of the body’s inflammation process. A chronic case needs to account for compensatory changes.
The tissue that is injured will also influence the timeline of a treatment plan. Different tissues heal at different rates due to biological make up and external and internal stressors.
The recommended treatment plan goals and visit frequency are based on researched ethical expectations that take into account stages of the condition and biology of injured tissue. Research as found you should expect 80-90% of acute symptoms to be gone within 2-4 weeks of treatment, about 5-6 visits, when utilizing chiropractic care. The last 10-20% of treatment takes a bit more time, active effort, and compliance. Please note, this is speaking of conservative care treatment for conservative care cases!
Research also supports that combination care is more effective than the individual treatments alone. Chiropractic adjustments, muscle work, exercises, diet, and rest are more effective together than simply choosing one route. Long term goals, chronic pain conditions, and injury prevention are dependent on this combination.
Of course the only way this is useful information and an effective treatment path for patients is if they are compliant. At our office we try to support easy compliance. At our office patients have the option to schedule out their appointments as far into the recommended plan as they wish. This allows for patients to consider their schedules and progress. Payment is collected at time of service to ease financial comfort for the patient and to hold our doctors accountable to the visit at hand.
To summarize:
- Treatment plans are designed to reach short and long term goals of being pain free and functional.
- Stage of the condition and the specific injured tissues are two aspects that determine goals and duration of a treatment plan.
- Research has shown what expectations a doctor and patient should have for the healing process and future injury prevention.
- It is always the patient’s choice to comply with recommended treatment plans. Successful recovery is not guaranteed if a patient does not follow through with a credible, researched treatment plan.
We hope to provide as much flexibility in hours and payment options to encourage easy compliance for our patient’s health success!
We Are Extending Our Office Hours!
Great News!
We are extending our office hours!
East End Chiropractic will now be open Tuesdays from 8am-1pm. We hope the morning extension will complement the working schedules of many of our patients. Having these additional hours will help with appointment consistency, more availability for new patient appointments, patient compliance, and overall treatment success! At this time, only Dr. Calabra will be available at the new Tuesday morning hours. Both doctors will be available as normal for all other posted clinic times.
If you have any other recommendations or suggestions on how our office can better serve the Nashville area, please let us know!
New Office Hours will start February 2nd, 2016!
Monday: 8am-1pm, 3pm-6pm
Tuesday: 8am-1pm
Wednesday: 8am-1pm, 3pm-6pm
Thursday: 8am-1pm, 3pm-6pm
Friday: 8am-1pm
As always, stay up to date with our clinic hours in association with holidays, continuing education seminars, or personal absence by checking our website or following us on Facebook and Twitter!
