We were lucky to catch up with Teresa Porter recently and have shared our conversation below.
Teresa, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today We’d love to hear about a time you helped a customer really get an amazing result through their work with you.
One of my favorite success stories was about a patient named Jane (we will name her Jane for this article). Jane is a 59-year-old female who has been suffering with fibromyalgia for majority of her life. She saw her primary care doctor who prescribed a medication for fibromyalgia. She took that for years, while still suffering low back pain. She thought that there was nothing she could do for her pain besides continue to take the medication.
Jane scheduled a new patient appointment with our office online. She comes in and is very skeptical and very nervous about the visit. She proceeds to explain her low back and shoulder pain and how it is likely just her fibromyalgia. After hearing her story, we do a series of tests to diagnose her. She has pain with prolonged sitting, pain bending forward and lifting, and pain with walking. She still has full range of motion and no red flags.
I begin to explain to her that this type of pain we see all the time, and how it could be related to fibromyalgia but unlikely. The pain is likely from working from home and sitting at a computer all day. Then we begin treatment. We did Graston on her low back to help her muscles relax. We adjusted her low and mid-back. Then we provided some exercises for her to do at home to keep her back happy.
Jane came back a week later and was night and day different. She had no back pain at all! This was the first time in 10+ years. After a couple more treatments, Jane was so satisfied with her back that she stopped taking her fibromyalgia medication and still had no lower back pain. She was able to function better, she wasn’t depressed or debilitated anymore due to her back, and she could do the things she loved without having to stop because of her back.
This is one of my favorite stories because if Jane never made an appointment, she might have dealt with low back pain for the rest of her life just believing it was fibromyalgia and there was nothing she could do about it. We truly changed Jane’s life – from painful to pain free.
Teresa, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?
My name is Dr, Teresa Porter and I own Tennessee Back Pain Center, along with my husband Dr. Logan Bates. We are both chiropractors that put a different twist on chiropractic. Our clinic is a hybrid between a chiropractic clinic and a physical therapy office. That means, with every visit, we adjust patients, work on their muscles, and prescribe therapeutic exercises. Research shows that when you couple adjustments with exercise the results are longer lasting pain-free results.
Even though we are chiropractors, we can work on anything in the muscul0skeletal system (Joints, tendons, ligaments, muscles, fascia, nerves, etc.). And we provide a different approach than most primary care, orthopedics, or physical therapists provide. We look at the body as a whole functioning system and then find the root cause of the pain. Meaning if you come in with foot pain, we are going to analyze your feet, knees, hips, low back, breathing patterns, etc. to properly diagnose why your foot hurts.
We are also very different than most chiropractors. With our clinic, there are no treatment plans. We base every visit on how you are feeling and how you are moving compared to your previous visits. And our top priority is to get you better and get you out of our office. That is another reason why we equip our patients with self-care exercises to keep their body in check, so they don’t depend on us.
We are also different because we work on both the joint and the muscles acting on the joint. Our services of muscle work include Graston, Cupping, Dry Needling, Nerve Flossing, Mckenzie (MDT), Dynamic Neuromuscular Stabilization (DNS), Active Release Technique (ART), and more. We have many tools in our toolkit because every patient is different. If our muscles are happy, our joints are happy and vice versa. So if you only work on the joints and not the muscles, you are missing half of the puzzle.
But the top characteristic about our clinic is we CARE about our patients! Our patients become our friends and family because we want to hear their whole life story. We want to hear their hobbies, goals, careers, and dreams so we can properly tailor their care to fit those needs. We love listening to what they have to say because it is often in the small details that big changes can be made.
How’d you meet your business partner?
Everyone loves a good love story! Well, this story starts in Chiropractic school at Logan University. I (Teresa) was one of the top biochemistry tutors at school and biochemistry was one of the hardest classes we took. Logan, who was a couple trimesters behind me, had met me during various extra-curricular activities and asked if I tutored him. I agreed and ended up tutoring him and his roommate in Biochemistry 1. I didn’t know this at the time, but Logan had developed a huge crush on me. The following semester, I continued to tutor him in Biochemistry 2. This time, it was just him and not his roommate. I could tell that Logan liked me when he asked me if I wanted to go fishing with him on Valentine’s Day. I quickly said no. A few days later, he asked me to go get TACOS with him at a local Mexican restaurant. We both had to stay late at school that day and it was a Tuesday, which meant $1 tacos. Well, if you know me at all, you know that I love tacos! So, I said yes. The date went well, clearly. About a week later, Logan fired me as his tutor so he could hire me as his girlfriend.
We knew we had a future together and wanted to start our own practice. On February 1, 2022, I started Tennessee Back Pain Center while Logan finished up school. He graduated in August 2022, and we got married in September 2022. And now we are happily married and happily running our business together.
How’d you build such a strong reputation within your market?
Tennessee Back Pain Center has a reputation of being different. Our top priority is to put the patient first and to provide for them the care that they NEED, not the care that will pay the bills. With a chiropractor on every block in Murfreesboro, we must be different. But we aren’t different just because we needed to be, we are different because we believe in truly helping patients get out of pain, regain function, and achieve their goals.
Our patients know that when they come into our office, they will have our full attention. We will listen to them, ask them several questions to help us understand their pain and their lives, and we will explain what we are doing and why we are doing it every step of the way! We get so many compliments that we are thorough because that’s what we strive to be. The musculoskeletal system is too complex to not look at an injury from several points of view.
Our patients also know that when they come into our office, we have their best interests at heart. We only do different treatments if we know they are going to help. And if we know that we can’t help them, we will refer them to someone who can. We are trustworthy because we are honest. And we are honest because it is important that patients understand their own health, conditions, injuries, and expectations.
Our reputation started when our patients and members of the community recognized our hearts behind why we do what we do. It has nothing to do with money and has everything to do with truly helping people feel better and get back to the activities they love.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.tennesseebackpaincenter.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tennesseebackpaincenter/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/tennesseebackpaincenter
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/tennessee-back-pain-center/?viewAsMember=true
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/TBackPainCenter
- Youtube: https://youtube.com/@tennesseebackpaincenter?si=Ux1lnNlJKpQkyzF4
- Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/tennessee-back-pain-center-murfreesboro