Studying Exercise Physiology, I have an understanding of what is involved when it comes to treating patients; however - I wasn’t too sure of how different health professionals can all work together and combine their skills and expertise to treat individuals with their care needs before starting as an assistant at Sunshine Coast Rehabilitation and Exercise Physiology (SCREP).
Taking a multidisciplinary approach is important at SCREP to give the best possible care to our patients. The biopsychosocial model can be used to gain an understanding of the connection between biology, psychology and socio-environmental factors that influence health and disease. This model helps our practitioners to identify the root cause of patient’s issues and combine their skills and expertise to implement a treatment specific to each individual across a number of different allied health professionals.
An example of the model is shown below;
To briefly explain, the biopsychosocial model focuses on the interactions between people’s genetic makeup (biology), their effect of injury and personality (psychology) and their sociocultural environment or their social world to look at the factors that contribute to a person’s experience of health or illness.
Biological impacts on health include things like
genetics
infections
Trauma
Nutrition
Hormones
Psychological component includes looking at factors including:
negative thinking
lack of self-control/discipline
emotional turmoil
Social and cultural factors:
family circumstances
work
peers
Combinations of the above can all affect how we progress with treatment and our health outcomes. My understanding of how a multi-disciplinary clinic includes various allied health professionals has dramatically changed. The focus to increase individual outcomes, reduce financial burden and most importantly increase quality of life has shown how effective a team environment in patient care is. The importance to combine the expertise of each or some of our professionals including Physiotherapists, Exercise Physiologists, Psychologists and Dietitians will only determine all underlying factors affecting a person’s health - more importantly, the focus of improving one’s quality of life.