If you have ticked any of the medical conditions above, please only proceed with approval from your doctor.

If you haven't already, check online advice for first aid treatement for the first three days following onset of pain or injury

0-3 days after onset

If you are doing first aid and wish to learn more, proceed with the questions.

If more than three days since onset of pain or injury, proceed with the questions below.

 

6. COMPLETE A BODY CHART DRAWING OF YOUR PAIN.

Draw on the body images below, all of your symptoms - pain, stiffness, deformity. Show where they are accurately as you can. Here's how.

Save Image of Body Chart. On a mobile device, press with your finger on the image until the menu presents itself. Then on an Apple Device touch 'add to photos'. On an Android, 'save image' and it will save to the Gallery App.

Open and MarkUp the Image on your device. Open your saved image. The apps that hold your images have mark up tools so that you can draw on the image.

On an android phone, the markup tools are in the menu of the icon picture-of-mountains-with-a-pen. In that menu you will find pencil and text tools.

On an Apple device: Open the image. Open 'edit'.  Open three dot menu (...) at the top right of the image. Open 'Markup'. You will see a choice of 3 different colour pens, an eraser, a colour palette, and a text box under the +sign.

On all mobile devices you select a pen by touching it. You can also adjust the pen line size. Then you can draw on the image with your finger on the touchscreen.

Drawing and Labelling Symptoms. On your mobile device, magnify the part of the body you want to draw your symptoms on by adjusting the image (usually with 2 fingers spreading apart on the touch screen). Draw on the image, the position of your symptoms. You can use a different colour for the different symptoms e.g sharp pain, ache, tingling.

You can also use the text box to label your symptoms on the image e.g. sharp pain, ache, tingling, stiff.

Adding Your Name to the Chart. Open a text box on the image. By touching and holding the text box, slide it to a blank space at the top left of the image. Let it go and then tap the text box to show the edit menu. Touch 'edit' and the keyboard will show up. Type your first and last name in the text box. You can adjust the size and position of the text box with your fingers, so it is not covering the image.

Follow more guidelines after the image, to write a detailed description of each symptom, there.

1. On a separate piece of paper, Write a list of your symptoms and the part of body, from the body charts. There are often a number of symptoms together. Often pain will have vague or large distribution. Just write as much as you can, accurately, about each thing you notice. Note: if your pain stretches along more than one segment of your body, you are advised to see a physiotherapist or doctor. A segment is a part of body between two major joints e.g shoulder and elbow, knee and ankle, low back and hip, Upper back and shoulder blade.
2. With each symptom write a description of when you notice the symptom, during the day or night, and the activity even if it is rest.
3. Also write the quality of the symptom: When you notice the symptom is gone. When you notice it is worst. Use these guides:

• Pain. For each type of pain write the amount of pain out of 10 where zero (0) is no pain and 10 is the most extreme pain you can imagine. 1-3 mild; 4-6 moderate; 7-10 severe. See here for further guidelines of the pain scale. You can also describe the type of pain eg sharp, aching, throbbing, dull, boney, stinging, burning, twinge, pinch.
• Restriction. When you move the body part during an activity, where does your movement stop because it feels it is blocked: Less than 30% normal = severe; 30-70% normal = moderate; 70-100% normal = mild.
• Weakness. When you are moving during an activity, when does it seem that you do not have the strength to do it.

EXAMPLE

Pain - Right Shoulder - Twinges when I lift my arm - Worst 6/10 - No pain when I am not using my arm 0/10
Pain - Left knee - Aches at night and keeps me awake - 7/10, eases when I get up and walk.
Stiff - Low Back - Difficult to put my shoes on - Comfortable when sitting.
Deformity - Stooped - Unable to straighten properly when I stand up.
Weakness - I cannot even lift my arm; When I go to step up my knee buckles.

The score for each symptom is from the left hand colum e.g 2 if the pain level is between 4-6/10.

Place the score for each symptom in the 4th row.

Add up the total score of all symptoms and divide by 3 to get the score of your function.

FUNCTION: Mild 1-1.6; Moderate 1.6-2.3; Severe 2.3-3

 

For Self Management:

MILD & MODERATE - START HERE

SEVERE - SEE YOUR DOCTOR OR HOSPITAL IMMEDIATELY

To BOOK A SESSION with a physiotherapist at Owen's Online Physiotherapy Service, select a fee option from the national income category table.