Recovery & Complex Case Consultation
If you’re stuck, let’s work out what’s missing.
If you’ve been dealing with a persistent or recurring health problem, it can become increasingly difficult to know what to do next.
You may have seen several practitioners, had a number of scans or investigations, tried different treatments and exercises, and received different explanations along the way. You may even have improved to a point, but feel you’ve now plateaued, gone backwards, or simply become stuck.
At Ridiculously Well, our principal Dr Colin Clarey offers longer Recovery & Complex Case Consultations for people who want a fresh perspective, a second opinion or some help finding a clearer way forward.
A different kind of consultation
These consultations are deliberately different from a standard appointment. Consultations are typically 45–60 minutes long, giving Colin time to hear and understand your story and complaints.
Together you’ll look at:
- what has happened and how the problem developed
- diagnoses you’ve been given
- scans, investigations or reports you may have
- treatments and rehabilitation you’ve already tried
- what has helped, and what hasn’t
- patterns of improvement, recurrence or flare-up
- your current exercise, movement and recovery strategies and capabilities
- factors that may be slowing your progress
- what you’re hoping to get back to
- and, importantly, what may have been overlooked, mis-applied or is still missing from your recovery plan.
The objective isn’t to find fault with previous care. It’s to make sense of where you are nowand identify reasonable and best next steps.
A second opinion without starting all over again
A Recovery & Complex Case Consultation provides an opportunity to bring the pieces together.
Colin can review the information you already have, examine you where appropriate, discuss the different explanations or treatment options you’ve been given, and help you understand what appears most relevant to your situation.
Sometimes that may identify something worth investigating further.
Sometimes the missing piece is better rehabilitation, strength or physical conditioning.
Sometimes it’s modifying load, movement or recovery.
Sometimes the problem has become more complex through persistent pain, protective tension, fear of movement or loss of confidence in the body.
And sometimes the best next step is simply the right practitioner or professional for the problem you actually have.
Finding the right person.
A consultation with Colin doesn’t automatically mean treatment within Ridiculously Well.
After more than three decades in clinical practice and working within a multidisciplinary team, Colin’s role is increasingly about helping people understand their options and navigate what can be a confusing health-care landscape.
That may mean recommending a member of the Ridiculously Well team or suggesting a GP, specialist or another health professional outside the practice.
It may mean that the treatment you’ve already been receiving is appropriate, but there are other pieces of your recovery that deserve more attention.
The goal is not to find another treatment for you. It’s to help you find a sensible and effective away forward.
Looking for the missing pieces
For persistent problems, Colin takes a broader view of the factors that may influence recovery. Depending on your situation, these might include:
Movement and physical capacity: mobility, strength, conditioning, activity tolerance and whether your rehabilitation has progressed far enough.
Pain and the nervous system: understanding persistent pain, sensitivity, protective muscle tension and the way the body can adapt around pain or injury.
Load and recovery: the balance between work, training, exercise, rest and what your body currently has the capacity to tolerate.
Understanding and confidence: whether you’ve been given a clear explanation of what’s happening and whether fear or uncertainty is preventing you from moving forward.
Lifestyle and wellbeing: sleep, stress, nutrition and other factors that can influence how well we recover.
The bigger picture: sometimes a physical problem occurs during a period of significant stress, injury, illness, grief, burnout or major life change. Those experiences don’t mean the symptoms aren’t physical; they may simply be part of understanding the whole person who is trying to recover.
Not every one of these areas will be relevant to everyone. The purpose of the consultation is to work out which pieces matter in your particular case.
Recovery Mentoring
For some people, the problem extends beyond deciding which treatment to have next.
Long periods of pain, injury, illness or reduced capacity can change how we live. They can affect work, exercise, relationships, confidence, identity and our sense of direction.
Colin’s own experience of significant injury and persistent pain ultimately broadened his work beyond traditional chiropractic care into recovery mentoring, nervous-system awareness, meditation (where helpful), movement and self-leadership.
Recovery mentoring provides a space to explore questions such as:
How do I work with my body rather than constantly fighting it?
How do I rebuild confidence after a long period of pain or limitation?
What can I influence myself rather than becoming dependent on treatment?
How do I move forward when the usual ways of doing things are no longer working?
For some people this becomes an ongoing mentoring process. For others, one or two longer consultations are enough to provide clarity and a new direction.
About Dr Colin Clarey
Colin has worked as a chiropractor for more than 33 years, including extensive experience with spinal pain, sciatica, persistent and recurring musculoskeletal problems, sports injuries and more complex presentations.
His clinical background includes postgraduate training in sports chiropractic, advanced dry needling and core strengthening. His hands-on approaches including highly skilled manipulation, mobilization and flexion-distraction therapy.
His perspective on recovery has also been shaped by his own experiences.
Today, much of Colin’s work revolves around a deceptively simple question:
“What’s the next most useful step or steps from here?”
Who might benefit from a consultation?
This may be worth considering if you:
- have a persistent or recurring problem that isn’t progressing as expected
- have tried several treatments without lasting improvement
- feel you’ve plateaued in your recovery
- have received different or conflicting explanations
- have scans or diagnoses but aren’t sure what they actually mean for you
- want a second opinion before deciding what to do next
- aren’t sure which type of practitioner would be most appropriate
- suspect something is missing from your rehabilitation or recovery program
- have lost confidence in your body after prolonged pain or injury
- want to become more active and capable but aren’t sure how to progress
- or simply feel stuck and want an experienced person to help you look at the whole picture.
Your first consultation
Most initial Recovery & Complex Case Consultations are 45–60 minutes.
Bring along any relevant scans, imaging reports, specialist letters or other information you think may help. Come prepared to tell Colin the story of what’s happened, what you’ve tried and where you feel you’re currently stuck.
The consultation may include physical assessment where appropriate, but hands-on treatment isn’t necessarily the purpose of the appointment.
The priority is understanding the problem, identifying possible missing pieces and leaving you with greater clarity about what to do next.
You don’t necessarily need another treatment. You may need a clearer direction.