Southwest Orthopaedic Physical Therapy Information Headquarters

• Now let’s talk about pain -The doctors use the common 1-10 pain scale to tell them where your pain is at any given time. My PT’s talk about 3 parts of pain:

1. 1) intensity of pain, is it a 1 or a 10 ----or somewhere in between
2.  2) Frequency of flare-ups, Sometimes , all the time or am I in remission?
3.  3) Duration of flare-ups.  How long do they last? Keep a journal to recite all of these to your Dr or PT.

SWOPT prides itself in the relationship that we form with our patients. Most of our relationship become more like a friendship and we offer that support that the patients need to help get to their goals and feel better. We are so lucky to have some amazing patients that inspire us everyday with their stories, struggles, and triumphs. Today we feature a story by our patient named Delores. We interviewed Delores about her time at SWOPT and here is her story. We want to thank her for her story.

I had bilateral knee replacement surgery last year and Kale Isaacson,PT suggested that

At Southwest Orthopaedic Physical Therapy, our patients are the most important part of what we do. It is thanks to them that we are able to continue to do what we love which is help our patients heal. We very excited to share a personal story from on of our valued patients, Leah. Please enjoy reading her story and we hope it can be used as an inspiration for others that face similar injuries.

Today we feature a patient success story. Barbara came to SWOPT recently and has allowed us to use her story as an example of what can be gained by attending physical therapy. It is thanks to her and all our patients that we can call ourselves a successful physical therapy clinic. Helping people heal is what we love to do and we are happy to share her story of healing.

*Please enjoy this inspiring story from one of our valued patients, Pat

October 2010 was a very different time for our patient Valerie. She recalls feeling defeated by life and had no endurance or strength to complete her everyday tasks. In June, Valerie had been diagnosed with Pancreatic Acinar Cell Carcinoma and had 2/3 of her pancreas, 80% of her stomach, intestine and colon removed. She was referred to Southwest Orthopaedic Physical Therapy by the New Mexico Cancer Center after undergoing surgery and 4 months of Chemotherapy.

Today about 10 a.m. I had physical therapy “Holy ^#@>!”, When I stood up to walk, my knees felt like someone hit them with a baseball bat, then covered them with bees. That may seem a bit over-dramatic- but it is a pretty good description of how I felt at the time. (Keep in mind that I am Irish and we never let the truth get in the way of a good story). One curious thing kept happening through all of this physical therapy, I became extremely thirsty throughout my PT sessions. I mean “Lawrence of Arabia” parched (see what I mean about being Irish).

My physical therapist came into my room today and and said she brought me a present. "A present for me? Oh you shouldn't have". I was curious about what the present might be. But judging from the cheshire smile on her face I can only imagine. She then reached around the corner and brought "the present" into the room.

"Ouch!" Oh my gosh I am really hurting! I mean I can't imagine why- they just filet'd me like a trout, took out my worthless knee joints and put in new ones, closed the wounds shut with over 50 staples I think they got from Home Depot.