It was with some horror that I listened to a recent patient inform me that her surgeon here on the coast had advised her to wait 12 weeks before starting rehabilitation and physiotherapy after her hip replacement. 12 weeks! During my military training the physio arrived the first day you woke up after surgery! Move it or lose it! In the UK as a whole the physio is usually heavily…
Surprising topic from me right? But if knee surgery is the best option for you there are 3 simple things that YOU can do to get a better outcome. The 3 S’s of a “happy” knee: Straight Strong (no) Swelling Working to achieve these before and after surgery (ahem or instead of??) will mean that you get the best results. If your knee treatment plan doesn’t include these it’s a…
The wonderful, glorious thing about medicine is that it is constantly improving and changing. But it means that keeping up to date on what really works is a job in itself. A British Medical Journal article once estimated that family doctors needed to do 60 hours of reading a WEEK just to have a broad understanding of the changes involved. And that is literally life and death. Is it any…
Your body works as a whole unit. A team. And that “work” of moving you forward still needs to be done even if one part doesn’t function that great. So another area picks up the slack. And when that part of the team doing the extra work gets too tired? You get pain. Now, if this is the situation it doesn’t matter how much fabulous treatment you get in the…
Every year, in January and over the summer I am contacted by physiotherapists who have read this article which I wrote a very looooooooong time ago. So I thought it time to update this a little with the information that I generally add when I get the emails! Estelle Mitchell, a UK-qualified physiotherapist with more than 26 *ahem, it’s more like 40 now! years’ experience, came to work in southern…
You’ve woken up and looked at yourself in the mirror, one half of your face has dropped and you are unable to make it move. Your first thought is, “OMG I’ve had a stroke!” Check FAST F – Face drooping A – Arm Weakness S – Speech Difficulty T – Time to call an ambulance (dial 061 in Andalucia) If these don’t apply then you could have a facial palsy…
I hate it when I hear that people have had “loads” of treatment for a problem but aren’t making progress. What a waste of everybody’s time (and probably money too!). And you, the patient, end up frustrated that you keep doing all the “right” things but aren’t making progress. But don’t give up hope! Because it could be that one of these simple changes could make all the difference. Get…
Out walking, on the playing field or tennis court, you fall and hurt your ankle. Annoying and painful, definitely. But now what? Feet up on the couch or off to A&E? Fracture or Sprain? These 4 quick tests, called the Ottawa Ankle Rules, are designed to eliminate people who do NOT have an ankle/foot fracture and thus, do not need an x-ray!! Can you take 4 steps (limping is allowed!)?…
Our theme for our Event this year is Our Trusted Health Network and on Saturday 29 September we are having an Open Day at our clinic in San Pedro so that our patients can meet the other health professionals who make up that network. Many of our patients have moved to the Costa del Sol from other countries. So they don’t have that automatic network that you do in a…
Well the end of summer seems to have arrived! I’m sure I blinked and missed the summer entirely. But with the new school term and cooler weather arriving it always feels like the time for fresh beginnings here on the coast. Many people are deciding to tackle things that might have got ignored during the hot, busy, chaos of summer. Like niggly health worries. Who to trust For many of…