“The well thought out care plan also helped to ensure that my current serious illness was caught in time to enable an early diagnosis. Neil recognised that the symptoms of pain I was experiencing were abnormal for me and encouraged me to seek medical help.”
Care plans are extremely important. Usually people seek care for some or other problem. Sometimes it’s minor, and sometimes it appears minor, which begs the idea of having regular check ups in the first place anyway.
So I prescribe a care plan and say this is what we need to do to get from point A to point B. Along the way we get to know each other and things change: Aches, pains, blood pressure, eczema… whatever. But sometimes things don’t change, or sometimes something new crops up. In this instance it was a small niggling pain in a specific place that was not normal for this person. However, if this client had come to me on day one and said, “I have this small niggling pain here, can you sort it out?” I would’ve have said, “Okay, let’s get to work and see what changes.” Precious weeks would have gone by.
Because this person stuck to the care plan I prescribed her in the beginning, we were able to identify a serious problem very early on. The reason is because I knew what was normal for her, and I knew what was not normal.
Earlier in 2008 I had the extreme good fortune to meet Neil Bossenger. This lovely young man knocked on my door one day to introduce himself as the new Chiropractor in my area. His enthusiasm and positive attitude made me want to “give him a go”. I had numerous “aches and pains” and it was time to do something about it.
He assessed me thoroughly and worked with me over several months and I started to feel much better. One by one my aches disappeared. I walked up Rangitoto on a school trip and was astounded that not only did my knee give me no trouble, but I reached the summit without my usual breathlessness. In fact I also have noticed that any minor cold I had last winter did not “go to my chest” as normal.
My temperamental lower back has never been better. My knee is no longer stopping me from walking, in fact on a recent trip to Europe, I managed many hours of daily walking with no problem.
The well thought out care plan also helped to ensure that my current serious illness was caught in time to enable an early diagnosis. Neil recognised that the symptoms of pain I was experiencing were abnormal for me and encouraged me to seek medical help. I turned out to have a brand new aggressive breast cancer requiring extensive surgery and chemotherapy, radiotherapy and hormone therapy to come.
From that time onwards we have moved into a different area of care. Neil and Pip have been there ready to help and support at every turn. My chiropractic care has been modified to what I can cope with and to the very important upper body nerves and spine. Neil has been incredibly gentle and careful doing only adjustments I can manage and yet he has kept me stabilised. While I might have expected to regress due to the limitations we currently have, on the contrary I am very healthy and experiencing no difficulties. I have now had 3 rounds of chemotherapy and I have done very well each time. During this period I have been seeing Neil twice weekly. Friends and family constantly remark on how well I look. I have no doubt that chiropractic is helping my body to cope with all the treatment I have and will receive.
I am extremely grateful for the care and attention I receive from both Neil and Pip and chiropractic in general. I have no doubt that chiropractic is the reason why I feel so good in spite of my current difficulties.