The Active Healthcare Practice

This review is a little bit special. 🤖💚

When Nicola booked in, I asked the question I ask every new client:

“How did you find me?”

Her answer genuinely surprised me.

“I asked AI who the best person in my area would be to help me.”

Apparently… it sent her to me.

As someone who spends hours creating free, evidence-based content about pain, injuries and recovery, that was a pretty special moment.

I don’t pay for adverts.

I just try to explain the science in a way that makes sense, be honest about what we know (and what we don’t), and treat every person who walks through my door as an individual.

So thank you, Nicola, for trusting an AI recommendation… and thank you for leaving such a lovely review afterwards.

And thank you to everyone who recommends me, shares my posts or leaves a review. Every one of them helps someone else find the support they’re looking for.

Apparently… even AI is paying attention. 🤖💚

This scar is nearly four years old… and we’re still helping it improve.

Almost four years ago, one of my patients fell onto glass, damaging tendons and nerves in her hand.

By the time I met her, around 18 months later, the wound had healed and she’d already worked incredibly hard through surgery and physiotherapy.

But she was still struggling.

Her scar felt tight, her thumb movement was restricted, and she had altered sensation in her middle and ring fingers.

Healing doesn’t stop when the stitches come out.

Scar tissue is simply your body’s way of repairing damaged tissue. We can’t “break up” scar tissue, but even years later we can often help improve a scar’s mobility, comfort and function.

Today, her scar is barely visible. It’s soft, flat and no longer physically restricts her thumb.

The scar has healed beautifully.

What’s left are the lasting effects of the original injury.

Over the last few years we’ve used a combination of TECAR therapy, gentle negative pressure therapy, scar massage and desensitisation exercises to help manage those remaining symptoms and make her hand feel more comfortable to use.

She later had a smaller operation to release some scar tethering around her thumb. We adapted the treatment as she healed, starting gently and progressing as the scar matured.

Little by little, the altered sensation has continued to improve.

She still comes for monthly treatment because it relieves the feeling of tightness and helps keep her hand comfortable.

Her hand isn’t perfect.

It may never be.

But nearly four years on, it’s still improving.

After an injury like this, we’re not just treating a scar.

We’re helping the hand and the nervous system become comfortable working together again.

TECAR, massage, gentle negative pressure therapy and desensitisation exercises… they’re all just tools.

The real difference isn’t the tool. It’s knowing which tool is right, at the right time, for the right person.

Sometimes the best treatment I give... is no treatment at all.

That probably sounds like a strange thing for a therapist to say.

After all, you come to me because you’re in pain.

But one of the biggest things I’ve learnt over nearly a decade in clinic is this:

Not everything that hurts is just a muscle or joint problem.

Now before anyone gets excited... I’m not a doctor, and I don’t diagnose medical conditions.

What I am experienced in is musculoskeletal pain.

I’ve seen a lot of aches and pains over the years, and after a while you start to recognise the patterns.

And every now and then, someone walks in and I find myself thinking...

“Hmm... this doesn’t quite fit.”

I can’t always tell you why.

I certainly can’t always tell you what it is.

I just know that I’d rather get another healthcare professional involved than carry on treating something that doesn’t feel quite right.

Sometimes it’s been as simple as asking someone to pop back to their GP for a blood test.

We’ve had patients discover things like vitamin D deficiency or pre-diabetes. Both can contribute to aches and pains that look musculoskeletal. Once those underlying issues were recognised and managed, the symptoms we’d been chasing often improved far more than another massage or treatment ever could.

Other times it’s been something that needed a consultant’s opinion.

And very occasionally it’s been something much more urgent.

I’m really lucky to have good relationships with local GPs, consultants, physiotherapists, chiropractors, osteopaths and other healthcare professionals. I refer people regularly because healthcare works best when we all stay in our own lane and work together.

I’d much rather lose a treatment session than miss something important.

So if I ever tell you, “I’d like you to get this checked first,” please don’t think I’m fobbing you off.

Quite the opposite.

It’s because your health is more important to me than filling my diary.

Sometimes the right treatment...
..isn’t treatment at all.

One of the biggest compliments I can receive isn’t someone saying they feel better…

It’s when they trust me enough to come back.

And when they trust me enough to recommend me to the people who matter most to them.

That kind of trust is never something I take for granted.

Healthcare is constantly evolving. New research, new techniques and new ideas emerge all the time, which is why I never stop learning. It’s not because I’m trying to collect certificates—I’ve actually run out of wall space for those! 😅 It’s because every client deserves the very best care I can give them.

Knowledge isn’t about sounding clever. It’s about making things make sense.

It’s about knowing when to treat.
Knowing when not to treat.
Knowing when to reassure.
And knowing when to refer someone on if that’s what’s best for them.

Knowledge is only valuable if it helps someone move better, hurt less, and leave feeling more confident than when they walked through the door.

Helen, thank you so much for your lovely review. Knowing that you trust me with your care—and trust me enough to recommend me to others—means more than you know. ❤️

🥇 The biceps gets all the fame… but the brachialis does most of the work.

Poor brachialis. Unsung Hero.

It spends its life quietly bending your elbow while the biceps poses for all the photos. 💪😂

Hidden underneath the biceps, the brachialis is actually your primary elbow flexor.

Every time you pick up the kettle, carry the shopping, pick up your kids, pick up the dog or use a screwdriver, your brachialis is quietly working away in the background.

Unlike the biceps, it doesn’t care which way your hand is facing.

Palm up, palm down or somewhere in between… it’s there every time you bend your elbow.

When it becomes overloaded, it can cause pain at the front of the elbow or lower upper arm. It can be mistaken for a biceps problem because it sits underneath it, but there are lots of possible causes of elbow pain, so it’s important not to jump to conclusions.

The good news is that muscles generally respond well to being loaded appropriately.

Treatment may help settle pain and reduce muscle guarding, creating a window of opportunity to move more comfortably.

From there, the aim is to gradually build the muscle’s strength and tolerance with the right exercises, so it can get back to doing its job without complaining.

👉 Swipe through to learn:

📍 Where the brachialis is
💪 What it does
⚠️ Why it sometimes becomes painful
✅ Exercises that may help build its strength and tolerance

Because successful rehabilitation isn’t about finding a magic exercise.

It’s about finding the right exercise, at the right intensity, at the right stage of healing.

💚 Educational information only. Elbow pain has many possible causes. If your symptoms are severe, follow a significant injury or aren’t improving, it’s worth getting them assessed.