“Hard work always pays off” that’s a tribute to my parents. In my short career as a healthcare provider, I’ve gotten a chance to meet a lot of people from all walks of life. After developing a thorough history, and assessing the amount of effort that each person applies to their own life, I take that into consideration when prescribing treatment plans to avoid frustration for both myself and the patient. The success of your healing has a direct relationship to the amount of work you put into your treatment.
Back pain is more likely to go away faster if you work at taking care of it.
That seems like such a simple answer and probably won’t get great Google ratings, but when you get down to the simple facts, typically people who get results faster are the ones that work at it. After 11 years of practice, I found that patients that are ambitious in life tend to heal from their injuries faster than those who are more sedentary.
A lot of psychological factors play into this. Is it because back pain is hindering their lifestyle and they’re less efficient? Is it their “Type A” personality and they don’t like to have things wrong with them? Most of the time it’s a combination.
Blue-collar workers that spend time doing physical labor are some of my best patients. They need their bodies to function and be efficient and they are quick to adhere to any treatment programs I prescribe. Ironically, this typically leads to fewer visits to my office and more home therapy. The person that aspires to not do much have much or achieve much in life, tends to be my longer-lasting patient. This is purely based on anecdotal evidence, but after 11 years I feel like I have recognized a pattern.
I think the saddest thing in life is that I’m noticing there are fewer ambitious patients each year- which is a reflection of our society lately. There’s a larger percentage of younger populations that I speak of that bewilder me with their life choices. A lot of my discussions with younger generations usually revolve around how little they want to work and how much money they want to make.
These conversations typically emulate their perspective when addressing their injuries. A typical low back sprain/strain injury can take as little as 2 weeks to fully resolve with 15 minutes a day of self-care and management, but often I see patients for 4-6 weeks because they choose not to partake in their own active treatment. I even implemented an online based rehab program that allows me to see when they log in and do the exercises and stretches that I prescribe. Inevitably the patients that actively log in and do the work heal faster.
So when patients ask how long will it take to heal their injuries I always tell them it will heal faster if they do the homework I prescribe and aren’t lazy.
Dr. Travis White 