What does an new patient appointment look like?
Congrats, you have scheduled an appointment to work towards your goals, reduce your pain and improve the quality of your life! Let’s talk about what a new patient appointment looks like at Endurance Sport and Spine. Prior to your appointment, you will get an email from the clinic. There are a number of questions about your health history, family history, social history and goes through a review of the different systems in your body. Some questions that will be asked are any known allergies & surgeries, how much water do you drink in a day, history of concussions, glasses/contacts, reproductive questions, shortness of breath, anxiety, etc… This gives Kirsten background information that might play a role in your pain.
When you get to the office, you will be greeted by someone at the desk. If you have to wait for Kirsten to finish a prior appointment, there is always a puzzle available to work on in the lobby. There is also a coffee machine & water in the lobby if you need a pick me up. Feel free to help yourself! There also might be a clinic dog that will be in the lobby. She is friendly but loves getting pets. If you do not want to be bothered by the dog, there are usually spots available on the couch where you can be separated from her.
Once in the treatment room, Kirsten will go through questions regarding why you are in for the appointment. This will include questions regarding your pain, your job, and those questions you filled out prior to the appointment. After that there will be a couple more sheets of paper to fill out for insurance purposes. After those have been filled out, Kirsten will go through a detailed exam. The exam will be targeted towards your area of pain but than any other areas that could provide valuable information for your care. This exam includes: range of motion, muscle testing, orthopedic tests, muscle tightness and possibly a gait analysis. If there is more information that needs to be obtained, this is where Kirsten will talk to you about what else we will need. Examples of this would be taking vitals to check heart rate, and discussing if there is a need to refer for x-rays.
If the exam there are no areas of concern with the exam, then Kirsten will get to work! She starts by assess muscles in the area of complaint to determine if there is a soft tissue component playing a role in your pain. She will also assess spinal restrictions, this involves motioning the spinal segments to see if they fill “stuck”. When motioning, you may experience an increase in discomfort or pain over restricted segments but you also might not feel anything. Kirsten will then adjust the areas she feels need to be adjusted. She will discuss with you the plan as to what needs to be done and determine that you are ok with the plan. She will end the appointment with going over a couple exercises that would be beneficial for you and your care. These exercises consist of stretching and strengthening exercises that are targeted towards your condition.
The new patient appointments typically last between 45-60 minutes depending on what needs to be done & how many areas are needed to be assess & treated. Most patients wear comfortable clothes due to wanting to be able to move during the exercises & not feeling restricted. You will also discuss coming back in for a follow-up later that week or within the next week to determine how the treatment felt, what your pain feels like and what the options are moving forward!
