We hope that you and your family remain well.
We can’t believe that we treated our last patient on Friday 20th March – such a lot has happened for all of us since that time.
We have missed looking after our wonderful patients, and we know that you have missed us.
During this time, Karen has been manning the phone and has helped many people manage with her down to earth, reassuring, holistic and problem-solving approach.
We have exciting news!
We are opening our clinic from the 1st June, but there will be some changes which we would like to tell you about.
Firstly congratulations to Freya, who is pregnant with her first child. Unfortunately due to government advice she is unable to return to offering face to face appointments till she has had her son.
Freya says: “I just about managed to announce my pregnancy to my ongoing patients before lockdown, by which time it didn’t feel like the right time to put it online! I’m just about to enter the third trimester now which has been deemed the highest risk period for pregnancy and coronavirus so will be staying away from clinic until I’ve had our little boy.
“The benefit of being locked down throughout the second trimester is it’s given me time to really experience my pregnancy. I’ve found some good exercises for my back pain while I can’t get treated and I’ve been reading all the pregnancy books I have. I might come back a bit less rested than before but I’ll be a lot better at understanding and managing pregnant patients!”
We wish Freya all the best and look forward to having her back in clinic.
Dan will be the first osteopath running a clinic. His availability will be:
- Tuesdays 11.00 – 16.15
- Fridays 10.00 – 15.15
We will be offering seven appointments per session.
Stuart will hopefully start in the next few weeks. We are recruiting for a new associate to join and cover for Freya.
Laura is not yet able to offer her face to face sports massage and therapy under government guidelines, but we will let you know as soon as she is back.
Safety Precautions
We will be using 45 minute slots for your 30 minute appointment to allow for cleaning time.
We will also be using alternate clinic rooms to give time for the rooms to aerate.
Prior to having a face to face appointment at the clinic we will need to carry out a pre-screening assessment over the phone. This has several elements to it, the combination of which aim to ensure your and your practitioner’s safety and to minimise risk in relation to COVID-19.
Pre-Screening Elements
Please read our Pre-Screening Appointments update, dated 13 November 2020.
1. The first part will be about you, your health, why you are seeking treatment, whether you fall into any of the risk categories currently indicated by the government, and your exposure levels to COVID-19.
2. The second part will be about what changes we have had to make at the clinic and what you can expect from your session.
3. The third part will be about what we expect from you, prior to, during and then following your session.
At the end of this process, if you are safe to receive treatment and agree to how we are operating in offering a face to face session, then an appointment will be booked for you.
You will not need to go through another full screening process to have subsequent treatment sessions.
As you can appreciate, this will take time, so we are having to charge £15. An osteopath will be conducting these and you can book online (in the future) or over the phone (01462 811006) or by email. We have also had to review our prices due to the costs of extra equipment and cleaning resulting in an increase of £5 per session.
We do have a COVID-19 policy which we will continue to review, and you are welcome to request a copy as we do not yet have it available on our website.
As you can appreciate, the situation regarding COVID-19 is changing all the time and we are doing our best, given the current climate, to continue as we have always done in providing a safe environment for you and our practitioners.
Thank you for your understanding of the changes that we have had to make during this difficult time and the ones that we will have to continue to make as more advice, information and experience of the situation becomes available.
Please take care and stay safe,
Karen, Dan, Laura, Freya and Stuart
The Shefford Osteopathic Clinic team.