Model of Care
what is your why?
What drives you to get out of bed in the morning before your alarm goes off?
What pumps you up to tackle the challenges of the day?
What will motivate you to persevere through all obstacles to achieve your goals?
The stronger your why, the more successful you will be.
Everyone thinks they are a champion until they get punched in the face. A true champion will get knocked down twice and get back up three times.
Who are you?
Look in the mirror and ask yourself, “Whose body am I living in?”, “Is this the body that I want to be living in?”.
Be brutally honest with yourself.
If you answer, no or I am not sure, then ask yourself, “What am I going to do about it?”, do not start listing excuses about why you are living in someone else’s body.
Champions grind to find the solutions. Champions attack challenges and embrace the learning opportunities associated with setbacks. Champions continually grow themselves mentally and physically. Champions have no excuses.
THERE ARE THREE TYPES OF PEOPLE
They enjoy the process of pushing themselves to achieve their maximum potential.
They may need help pacing themselves so that they do not hurt themselves in the process.
Ortho Athlete enjoys helping Champion types 1 and 2.
Type 3 people are not a great fit and we encourage you to find another health care provider to help you.
Active, passive care and the chronic pain epidemic
There is an ongoing debate within healthcare as to whether active or passive care is better. Ortho Athlete does not debate which is better but instead uses whatever active and passive therapies and techniques are most beneficial for each individual patient.
We combine the best of active care with the best of passive care to try to get you better as fast as possible and stay better as long as possible. This type of care puts you at the center by empowering you to have control over your own condition. With this empowerment comes responsibility and accountability for your own health and the way that you feel. We are part of your team, and you have the responsibility to be accountable to yourself for your progress.
We take immense pride in explaining to you what your condition is, how it developed, and what you need to change in your life to change the way that you feel. We try to help you understand what type of life you want to lead, what your goals are, and help you to develop a roadmap to achieve the mind and body that you are identifying with.
Evidence-based Medicine
WHAT IS EVIDENCE-BASED CARE?
Evidence-based practice combines high-quality research evidence with clinical experience and patient values to drive healthcare decisions. Evidence-based medicine is critically important to physicians, patients, policymakers, employers, and payers. This data and value-driven evolution will affect healthcare in many ways. It should serve to level the playfield to allow all parties to be treated fairly, transparently and ensure that patients have a choice of provider for high quality cost-effective healthcare services.
Ortho Athlete Standard Evidence-Based Treatment Plans
what to expect
BEFORE YOUR INITIAL VISIT
We will ask you several intake questions to help us best prepare for your first appointment so that we can provide you with the highest quality care possible.
We will attempt to verify your insurance benefits and give you as clear a picture as possible of your financial responsibility.
We will request all pertinent past medical information including other providers you have seen and prior imaging to the affected region of your primary complaint.
Our providers will review all this information in preparation for your first visit.
We will collect your copay, deductible or coinsurance before each visit and help you to schedule out your treatment plan in advance, so that you can get the most convenient times possible.
INITIAL VISIT
1 hour and 15 minutes
You will complete some important intake information to help our providers better understand you and your complaint to assist us in providing the highest quality care possible. 15 minutes
Our chiropractic physician will meet with you to take a detailed history and perform a comprehensive examination of your primary complaint. They will then discuss with you what is wrong, contributing causes and explain a treatment plan of action for you to do in our office and at home. If the provider feels that this is a condition that they can help, they will begin treatment as well. Treatment may include chiropractic joint manipulation to address joint dysfunction, neuromuscular techniques to address soft tissue dysfunction and our licensed athletic trainers may introduce you to functional therapeutic exercises, home care and in-office anti-inflammatory and pain control treatments such as ice and electrical muscle stimulation.
Regular Treatment Visits
VISITS 2-5, 7-11, 13-14
25 Minutes
You will be treated by your chiropractic physician with joint manipulation, neuromuscular reeducation techniques for the affected soft tissues, and monitoring of your home-based functional therapeutic exercise program with manual biofeedback assisted functional therapeutic exercises. 15 minutes. You will receive anti-inflammatory and pain control techniques 10 minutes
Reexamination Progress Update Treatment
Visits 6, 12, 15
30 Minutes
You will come five minutes early to repeat important paperwork to objectively assess how your condition has changed by repeating your pain and disability scales that you filled out on the first visit.
Your chiropractic physician will be looking to see if you have met minimally clinically significant improvement. If you have, then you will progress to the next phase of care. If you did not and you do not have significant complicating factors to justify the lack of progress, then your provider will consider further diagnostic imaging and/or a referral to comanage your condition with another medical provider.
Your chiropractic physician will repeat any positive initial examination findings to verify your condition is improving.
You will be treated by your chiropractic physician with joint manipulation, neuromuscular reeducation techniques for the affected soft tissues, and monitoring of your home-based functional therapeutic exercise program with manual biofeedback assisted functional therapeutic exercises. 15 minutes. You will receive anti-inflammatory and pain control techniques 10 minutes
Care Completion Options
After successful completion of your treatment plan, you and your chiropractic physician will discuss two options:
Option 1
Dismissed as needed to return when you need to or return when you have a new complaint.
Option 2
Dismissed to chronic supportive care every two to four weeks to help maintain the progress you have made and keep your condition from relapsing despite being compliant with your continued home care plan.
TEAM MEDICINE
WHAT IS INTEGRATIVE AND COLLABORATIVE MEDICINE?
Just like it takes a team to protect and serve our great nation, our state, our county and our community, high-quality healthcare requires a team as well.
Your health care team needs to work together to safely protect, support and guide you in achieving your healthcare goals. If you find that one of your team members refuses or rejects playing their role on your team, then find a replacement. Just like no team functions at its potential with one player playing all the positions, no one provider has the answer to all your questions, concerns, and challenges. Make sure you are comfortable being honest and upfront with all your team members and that they provide excellent advice but also take into consideration your individual values.
The Ortho Athlete team internally integrates care and externally collaborates with various health care provider specialties, to provide our patients with comprehensive and effective multidisciplinary care.
We review all your pertinent medical records, imaging, and diagnostic testing before we treat you so that we understand the path that you have already taken. This preparation is like scouting an opponent before a championship game. Our opponent is your medical condition and the more we know about it the better planning, preparation, and action plan we can develop together with you.
Our services and programs are designed to empower champions by promoting active patient-centered care and require patients to be active both in-office and with home-based care.
We find and address many lifestyle challenges that contribute to the patient’s condition and supply recommendations and modifications that are both effective and empowering for long-term results.
Our team focuses on making you feel comfortable, welcome, and listened to, every step of the way, from the moment you enter our doors.
We work directly with patients, and collaboratively with physicians and other medical providers, to ensure your care is crafted to your individual conditions, needs, and values.
WHO TO HAVE ON YOUR HEALTHCARE TEAM
Healthcare is a team effort.
Each healthcare provider is like a member of the team with a special role. Some team members are doctors who help diagnose disease. Others are experts who treat disease or care for patients’ physical and emotional needs.
PRIMARY CARE PHYSICIAN (PCP)
This professional is the center of the team and should be aware of all the other providers that you are seeing and should support you in your healthcare values. We encourage you to interview a couple of different providers and find the right one for you. Explain to them what your healthcare values are and make sure they will respect them. Make sure to ask them if they have any objections to the other team members that you have or would like to assemble.
CHIROPRACTIC PHYSICIAN
Chiropractors practice in many ways. We encourage you to find one that has training in soft tissue therapy as well as joint manipulation and basic low tech active rehab exercises. Find one that values active patient participation and practices according to evidence-based, outcome-based medical standards such as the Council on Chiropractic Guidelines and Practice Parameters.
orthopedist
This professional specializes in more invasive types of treatments such as injections and surgical procedures. There is a time and place for everything and sometimes when normal anatomy has been damaged it is necessary to comanage your condition with more invasive options. Working together with your orthopedist can help to give you the long-lasting relief that you need.
REHABILITATION THERAPIST: LICENSED ATHLETIC TRAINER, PHYSICAL THERAPIST, OR OCCUPATIONAL THERAPIST
This provider will work with your chiropractic physician and address muscular weakness or tightness. Providers at Ortho Athlete use “Medical Soft-tissue Release” which is a combination of Graston, deep tissue orthopedic massage, myofascial release, trigger point and PNF therapy to loosen and lengthen tight muscles and fascia and release scar tissue adhesions. They develop functional therapeutic active rehabilitative strengthening and conditioning exercise programs, which they use in-office with manual biofeedback to help facilitate muscles that are weak or not contracting properly. They will prescribe exercises to perform at home that complement the in-office active and passive treatment. They will provide training in posture, ergonomics, and biomechanical training.
NUTRITIONIST/DIETICIAN RD, ND
Nutrition is an essential part of health. This professional can advise you on the specific nutritional requirements of your condition and find potential deficiencies or excesses that you may have.
They can also help you with meal planning.
