Exercise Prescription

How many of you regularly prescribe rehabilitation and self-care exercises to your patients?

And how many of you get frustrated when patient-compliance is relatively low?

Most of the time you'll blame the patient but how often do you blame yourself?

Well for the last couple of years I've placed blame entirely upon myself when patients tell me they haven't done their exercises. Sometimes it's because I've given them more than they can chew and occasionally it's because the exercises I had provided weren't relevant to their condition. And when the latter is the case, I'll consider it lazy on my part.

However, over the last several years patient compliance has skyrocketed translating into more successful care. There are two reasons for this: 1) more appropriate exercise selection and 2) video.

In the former case, taking the time to identify which exercises the patient actually needs has definitely sharpened my exercise prescription skills. For the latter, using video for home use has helped patients perform their exercises with more accuracy. Now how have I done this? For exercise prescription, I take the time to perform a clinic audit process to identify the most appropriate exercise that will address the key link to their functional pathology and for video, well I've simply used the power of youtube and a sheet of paper to direct my patients to when they get home.

Just circle which ones you want them to do

But it seems like there might just be an easier way to use the power of video. I mean, sometimes patients will tell me that their dog "ate their sheet" and other times, they'll confess that they lost it. But thankfully, Dr. Phil Snell has created myrehabexercise.com to make things that much easier.

Now unlike Phases, Phil has compiled a database of some of the most up to date rehabilitation exercises that actually gets you results. Granted, it is up to you to use your head a little and utilize the clinic audit process mentioned above to find the most relevant, patient-specific exercise along their own continuum. But once you find it, I'm sure Phil will have it on his site. And if he doesn't, just let him know and he'll film it.