Historical Review: Helps You Organize for an Upcoming Visit, and Helps the Health Provider Immensely!

A   What is your Assessment of the problem (what do you think it is)?
What part of your Anatomy is involved?

     When you are seeing a healthcare provider about your symptoms, try to be organized in your thoughts. Standardized questions that you will be asked may not hit on the individual issue you are facing. Perhaps, boring to some who want to have full faith that the medical people will ask the key questions, this self examination that I have started several posts ago may hone in on your injury right from the start. 

     Of these self examination questions, your Assessment of the Problem may be the most important. I have so many patients tell me that they knew the diagnosis was not what the doctor or therapist came up with and stuck with for the year of unsuccessful treatment, but for some reason never spoke about what they thought was going on. Get it out on the first visit.

     This also applies to patient's fears that they need alleviated. The two common fears are cancer when a mass or growth is on the foot, or that the diagnosis will mean they will never walk again. If you have a concern like this, the question can be phrased simply "could be cancer, or will this mean I will have permanent problems?" 

    And lastly, the Anatomy involved should really be honed in before your appointment. Foot and ankle pain that I deal with can be very vague and that works against our finding some answers. At least if the problem involves a big area try to focus on what hurts the most. And, don't be like some of my patients who put their foot up and say it hurts, but can not really advance the discovery from there. In their defense, sometimes feet or ankles only hurt when you are doing something (running, hiking, dance, etc), and stop hurting completely when you stop. But, the more help I can get from the patient's self examination of the problem, usually the better.