A required and even critical part of every visit you have with your doctor is your “chief complaint.” The chief complaint is the section of the note in which your physician identifies the reason you came to see them that day. If you are seeing your primary care doctor the chief complaint might be, “annual physical exam, ” or “shortness of breath” or “chest pain” or even “I just don’t feel good.”
In orthopedics, most of the time when the surgeon lists the chief complaint they describe which joint you have pain in. Examples would be “right hip pain” or “left shoulder pain” or “back pain.”
I think these typical answers are wrong.
Yes, the patients I typically see have either hip pain or knee pain, but after years of listening to my patients I have come to understand that this is not what brings them in to see me. Patients come to see me with hip or knee pain when that pain starts to interfere with their life.
They come to see me when..
- they used to be able to walk 2-3 miles but now can’t even walk 1
- they struggle getting through a round of golf
- they no longer look forward to trips
- it gets harder and harder to enjoy doing stuff with their grandkids
- their joint gets so stiff, it is hard to put shoes and socks on
- they have a hard time standing up after sitting for a long period of time
- their knee or hip make it difficult to sleep
Occasionally some patients have such severe osteoarthritis that when I ask them what they can’t do they respond by saying “Everything!”
The Destination Affects the Journey
I believe that how we begin a journey affects our ability to arrive at our destination. When we start by saying the chief complaint is knee osteoarthritis, we start at the wrong place. The goal isn’t to simply treat osteoarthritis. The goal is to help people get their life back.
My first question for every patient is to ask them what their knee or hip pain keeps them from doing.
Together, we then make it the goal of their treatment to get back to those activities. I always discuss treatment options so patients understand the different ways they can get there. Some end up having surgery. Some do not.
But the goal for every single patient is to help them get their life back.
This is how I measure success. This is how I measure outcomes.
Do you have hip or knee pain caused by osteoarthritis? What does it keep you from doing?
Click here to learn how to make an appointment to discuss your options.
