The diagnosis includes the answers to the following questions:

Where to treat?

The first answer that jumps to mind is the injured area. However, is it that simple?

Generally, most soft tissue injuries are local problems, which means that they are limited in one part of the body. But does the recovery restrict itself in the local area too?

Besides locating the injury, to get a precise diagnosis also means knowing what exactly happens in the injured part. Questions like these sometimes have no clear answer.

Above are the reasons why Dr. Song sometimes needs more than a couple of sessions to locate the critical location of an injury and find what exactly prohibits the body from recover itself. Once the problems are solved, most patients will feel a significant change in the treatment course.

Usually, in case of a soft tissue injury, the injured part is quite clear, but is that always the location we should treat? If we think a little deeper, the primary reason for the injury has disappeared. Now, it is time to figure out what are the reasons for slowing down the recovery. Will those reasons be localized in the injured part of the body? The clinical experience shows otherwise. That is why Dr. Song believes in a holistic view when looking at the injury and its recovery. This theory makes sense when you consider that though people with similar injured areas, they may differ in treatment methods.

Another factor to be considered is that the injured body is alive! From the moment that the body is wounded, it starts self-recovery. Self-recovery means there could be a lot of compensation, and not all of them are beneficial. It is why the more chronic injuries recover slower. For example, a person suffers chronic lower back pain may experience many different pain spots during an extended period. In a specific treatment session, which of these spots is the painful location must be treated? The answer could be any or none! It depends on the therapist’s assessment and judgement. Here, not only the knowledge but also the experience plays a critical role.

What was the previous condition before the injury?

It is common for a person to be only concerned with the injury itself and ignore the body’s condition before the injury. But if you think that it was the trauma alone that caused your current situation, you are mistaken. Because before the wound took place, there is usually some hidden abnormality. For example, you may use your right hand awkwardly for long time before you pulled your right elbow muscles. Or you may suffer from a stiff neck before a whiplash associated disorder appeared due to a car accident. All these kinds of body conditions may or may not relate to the injury, but they can relate to your recovery. A therapist must understand these previous conditions to treat their patients better.

How does the body react to the treatment?

Most people feel a difference after the first treatment session, but not all of them feel better. Some of them either feel the initial symptoms getting worse or feel some new discomfort, such as muscle soreness. Why? It is hard to tell the exact reasons, but this type of phenomenon is related to the patient’s body condition. Usually it happens more often in patients who are weaker and have more severe symptoms, and thus suffer the temporary worsening of symptoms. The good news is if the patient feels worse in the first couple of days after treatment, and then the whole condition getting better than before the procedure, the patient usually recovers faster. If not, the therapist must consider a change in the therapeutic strategy, and the treatment course could be longer.

Overall, the body’s reaction after the first couple of sessions is in part of many factors that need to be considered to get a more definite diagnosis.

Of course, there are many other factors related to the diagnosis, such as health history, treatment history, laboratory exam results. However, the more complicated situation the patient has, the more difficult it is to get an accurate diagnosis. For an experienced practitioner, a diagnosis never comes at the first expression.

FAQs:

· Does Dr. Song use other’s diagnosis?

Yes. But it is always a reference. A practitioner must follow his diagnosis to make a treatment plan and take responsibility.

· How does radiography help with the diagnosis?

A radiographic picture or the report will always be helpful, but neither can be used to replace clinical diagnosis. Actually, in most cases, a bone spur or a disc hernia may be shown on the graph, but it is not the direct reason for the clinical symptoms.

· How many sessions do I need?

It is really depending on each individual case, but you may use the chart as a reference.